Are the Days of Rooting Android Phones Coming to an End?

This is not necessarily the type of subject we like to begin a new week with, but as I can tell from my inbox and Twitter feed, many of you are looking for our opinion on thismatter. Over the weekend, our buddy P3droid put out a memoir of sorts on the future of the rooting scene on Android which dove into subjects like bootloaders and how carriers plan to stop you from ever fully enjoying your device. The knowledge he shared scared the hell out of many of you, and to tell you the truth, it should. The details he presented over the weekend are ones that he’s been whispering in my ear for months now, so to see him go public with them, I can assure you that he means business.

So what did he say? (I’ll do my best to sum it all up for you.)

July 2010: Rumors started flying that Motorola was working on ways to make rooting much more difficult than in the past by tweaking the kernel. Fortunately for us, Froyo on the DX was rooted and life went on. (Note: This was also the first time we really saw a locked bootloader here on U.S. soil.)

October 2010: Word began to leak out that locked bootloaders would become the norm and not just from Motorola devices; other manufacturers were jumping into the game and were probably being pushed by carriers. The motivation behind this new carrier stance was theft of service by rooted users, the return of non-defective devices due to consumer fraud, and the use of non-approved firmware on the networks.

December 2010: Multiple carriers began to test a service that would allow them to identify rooted users and create a database of their MEIDs. New security features were also being baked into stock ROMs on devices such as identifying rooted phones and throttling those that were tethering illegally.

March 2011: Verizon and another major carrier seem to be tracking rooted phones by seeing who has not accepted updates. They also seem to be doing this as of right now, meaning you could be on their list if you have a rooted device. New builds for phones will include a tracking code which if removed, could potentially leave your phone lifeless without data or voice access. The overall goal here is for carriers to lock down devices tighter than ever, but then provide 1-2 dev devices each year for those of us that wish to actually enjoy our phones.

If that doesn’t give you enough detail, you can read the full writeup at My Droid World.

My thoughts?

This isn’t surprising at all. Do I think we should all freak out? Not…yet. It was only a matter of time before the freedom we’ve enjoyed on Android started to fade away as all of these carriers realized that “open” isn’t necessarily good for their bottom lines. With data theft (tethering for free) more than likely climbing by the minute and bloatware contracts flooding handsets, it’s almost shocking that this didn’t happen sooner. The cell phone business hasn’t always been the most consumer-friendly, so why should we expect it to be now?

If P3 is right, and we see a couple of developer devices each year that will be unlockable, we won’t be entirely S.O.L., but I’m just wondering how top of the line they’ll be. The current time frame for the Nexus S to land on another carrier besides T-Mobile is maybe in the summer which would put that device at 7-8 months old. Locked or unlocked, I don’t want a phone that’s almost at the end of its life cycle even if it is more root-friendly. I’m just scared that carriers will offer up these “unlockable” devices, but make them no where near the level of new locked down phones in terms of specs. Ugh.

I should point out that we have no idea what Verizon or any of these others carriers plan to do with the information they are collecting about rooted users, but you can bet that we’ll know before too long. With 1-year upgrades disappearing, new 4G LTE networks and amazing high speeds taking over, and manufacturers like HTC seemingly giving into to carrier lock-down demands, it’s time to get real picky when it comes to your next phone purchase.

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I really enjoyed reading this post, I always appreciate topics like this being discussed to us. Thanks for sharing.

Anonymous

Why is 7-8 months considered “almost at the end of it’s life cycle?” For a site that reviews these sorts of things I understand. For the rest of us….no.

Not to sound like Mr. Frugal, but even 2 years isn’t a full life cycle for most phones that are taken care of.

Ever since the days of my VX4400 on howardforums people would cycle through new phones seemingly on a monthly basis. Yes, on a family plan this is achieved very inexpensively, but after that, you pay full price unless you go contract. Yes I realize you can sell a phone for a good chunk of change, but there will usually be a price difference.

How can people stand to afford this AND go through the effort of getting phone after phone after phone???

Ben T

Thethering is NOT data theft. Charging customers for tethering when they do it without rooting their phones SHOULD be illegal. The only thing we should be paying for is network access. If the carriers can’t handle that, then what the hell are they doing in this business?

Anonymous

You’re right on all counts. BUT the contract unfortunately trumps these arguments….for now.

Avpwarranty

I have a question. What about those of us who leave the big providers and go with the Simple Mobiles and Crickets out there who dont really seem to care about tethering. If everyone started jumping to them carriers would the outcome be the same for those that did?

Anonymous

Except those carriers, like cricket don’t even provide basic amenities like call waiting…

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if the carriers keep doing this, at some point a new carrier will spring up and offer the freedom to root your phones and as a result that carrier will be the dominate carrier in the us

Sputnick

How many bricked Nexus One’s are out there? Probably very few if any. Make it easy to root and sell tiered data plans. Employ a failsafe recovery to make it impossible to brick phones even for the common user. Are ya with me?

MikeP

Huh.

My wife’s Eris was 100% useless (she went through 6 of them with returns because they couldn’t reliably work) with stock.

It was obviously the same software problem over and over, but if they don’t acknowledge it, the standard response is we’ll send you a new one. So we went through 6 in a month and a half.

It really sucked when we had emergencies, and she couldn’t answer her damn phone because someone had sent her a text without a subject or message sometime in the past. Pretty ridiculous.

We rooted in and put a custom ROM on it, and it works wonderfully.

It wouldn’t be bad, you know, if carriers actually supported their devices, had some real tech support, etc but as far as I can tell they don’t. They might say that they do, but being an Eris owner, we know otherwise.

My rooted OG Droid does everything I need still, and I was planning on getting some new phones in a couple of months, but I may just wait it out if they’re going to start beign pains in the asses about me being able to make sure that the phone you know, actually works.

Concern

It is has come to the point that companies do not respond to customer demand. They give us what they will and have various means to make us accept it. Competition is more illusion than real.

Yo momma like it

if this stuff really starts to happen im sorry to say but im going to the i*hone 5

Anonymous

Why? So you can go from a locked down phone to a fort-knox-locked-down phone???

I agree. Amazon MP3 – Verizon Visual Voicemail. Just want them gone without having to root.

Johnzenobia

I think google will launch their own cell coverage,I cant believe that google is happy with their system being locked down when the whole idea of android was to not be locked down. these carriers are just like the federal government wanting CONTROL.

This is all the consumer’s fault. Now that Android is on top, they are going to do what they want. The consumer made their choice, and now we’re getting screwed for it. I’m getting a land line. Why aren’t people fighting this? Why do we just sit here and take it? These companies need to be punished by the consumer, not rewarded by purchasing their products.

Kwest12

I think you’ll see people starting to taken action in the form of switching to the iphone. I hate to say it but I feel my reasoning is sound:

The average consumer now a days doesn’t do much research before buying. The majority of those people end up with iphones b/c it’s trendy, they know the name and apple has what seems to be the the single most effective marketing strategy in the history of electronics.

Those who do minimal research will see the numerous “lock down articles” that are certain to start spring up everywhere. Those articles will sound negative. No one talks about the iphone being locked down so those people will end up with an iphone too.

People like me who have done their homework are also going to start realizing that the iphone jailbreaking is becoming more and more mainstream and android is becoming more and more locked down. Well once everything is locked down, what’s to keep me? The operating system is less mature, the apps are lower quality, the accessories are inferior/ scarce, and the integration with other hardware is almost nonexistent. The only thing to possibly keep me would be superior hardware: unfortunately it seems that this superior hardware is almost always accompanied by crappy battery life. Also, it’s highly unlikely that apple will allow android phones to outpace their hardware by a large margin. I really don’t want to switch to an iphone but I honestly think it’s gonna play out that way.

Anonymous

Wow, reading all of this and thinking about it is kinda depressing. Customizing (including rooting to get custom roms) is what makes me love android. Im always waiting for the new devices to come out so we can see all the goodies, mods, roms, and how much faster devs can make each new device be. When devs make custom roms I know we arent the only ones downloading and playing with them. Every bit that is taken from us has to just lead to the next theft. Who knows, in a couple years maybe android will be no more exciting than ¡0$, or w¡nm0b.

Maybe people wouldn’t root their device (in my case to load a non bloat rom), if carriers like at&t didn’t take 6-9 months to update their devices (if at all). I know the galaxy S phones just got the 2.2 update just a few weeks ago, and the streak users got it in February. I got my streak full retail off contract direct from Dell in mid October. I was told after purchase at&t would release the 2.2 update in November, then December, January and finally February. I got tired of waiting and downloaded it in December.
My phone, I paid for it, I should be able to do with it as I please. Until enough people start balking at the carriers, they will continue to screw the consumers. With At&t & Verizon the only games in town, so to speak, you think they care what the consumers think?

Johnzenobia

If the carriers try to stop any type of rooting/jailbreaking then all it does is fuel the fire for someone to work around it. How many times has the apple iphone been jailbroken? How about the sony PS3? The carriers will try and someone will break it. Makes me laugh actually.

Unacceptable. When/if this system go’s into effect, I expect some form of legal action. DMCA law says I can root/unlock my phone at the risk of my warranty. If the law says I can do it, the carriers should have to let me do it/ I bought the device, I own the device, just because the carrier thinks I should use my phone their way does not give them the right to shut my service off. Im pissed.

All that law says is that they can’t sue you for it. They can do whatever they want to prevent you from doing it.

PO’d

Interesting that a company that sells you an item locks it down, or restricts what it can do, then tracks those of us that unlock it. Unless it’s disclosed in the three sentence contract that you sign, it won’t hold up in a court of law if they decide to turn your service off. What’s going to end up happening is the first time someone that has a rooted phone needs to dial 911 and can’t, there will be one HELL of a lawsuit.

If I buy something, I consider it mine and can use it any way I want. If I use it illegally, then that’s a different story, but in order to overclock the CPU, add ROMS etc., should be MY choice…not theirs. If I void the warranty by doing so, then so be it…I’ll just buy another.

Just my 2 cents. 🙂

DBK

I’m pretty sure the contract is more than 3 sentences. Plus they do send you the legal disclaimers and policy info when you get your phone. Depending on the situation, it could hold up.

I do agree with the second part. If you root/unlock to increase the performance of the phone (or to theme it out), then it shouldn’t be a problem. If you do it to abuse the system, then the carrier needs to step in.

Unfortunately, a significant amount of *hackers* opt to abuse the system rather than do what you would do, thereby ruining it for the rest of us.

jason w.s.

BTW, Wow, talk about Night and Day…I was just over at TIPB (iPhone site) and not only is Jailbreaking the iphone gettin very normal and accepted, but it seems to be getting mainstream. Toyota apparently has made a bunch of Scion themes (a different theme for each model Scion) that are available in Cydia for free, specifically made for the Jailbreaking crowd. And theyre thinking that some other major companies and corp’s are gonna follow suit. Pretty cool..

DBK

Don’t read these posts the wrong way. We’re not against rooting or unlocking, just against how that is utilized. To improve the performance of your phone or theme it out is one thing, to abuse the system is quite another.

jason w.s.

Oh i understand, completely. I just meant the state in general of rooting with Android and where its headed….the whole mood about it and attitude towards it these day. Its like a difference of night and day, between Android and iOS. Im one of the few that digs both. Im not bitter and i dont hate on one or the other. Theres things i really like about both OS’s….its all good 😉

DBK

I don’t think *pple likes their devices getting jailbroken. But your right, it seems to be the trend now for *OS users. And after all that bragging about not needing to (or wanting to) hack their devices, and now they do it almost as much as we do. lol After all that bichen, they end up following our lead. 😛

Kwest12

Take a look at my post a ways down (aka earlier) about why I think this move will end up decimating three android hacking community and send them running to hack the iphone. Imagine that; the combined hacking prowess of the current iphone guys and the android guys working away on a single phone. Talk about hacking power. Unfortunately I think my next phone might have to be an iphone if all this android locking down comes to pass. (again see my earlier post for further rationale)

Anonymous

Sorry, I don’t use my rooted phone to steal tether, and I understand the argument, but aren’t companies like motorola, htc, etc just killing themselves off with this? I mean, before the OG Droid, what was Motorola’s best phone? The Razr? It sure wasn’t the “Q” on winmo.

I am wondering how legal this is. I mean it is my property. And I know they are charging people if they are tethering without a plan. If they can tell this then they should be doing that. They send a warning saying you are going to be charged if you continue to tether and then charge you. They already do this so whats the problem? Keep doing it. and when it comes to warranties, if you know who is rooting make sure the problem is from rooting and make them pay the money for the new phone like they say when you try to get a warranty fixed anyhow.

DBK

Two problems:
1) Those that get warned tend to fight the warning and, in the end, more money is lost than gained.

2) According to Big Red, it costs more money to be thorough with the warranty claims than it does to lock down the phones, which is BS. They save more, but will make the same amount of profit, if they were thorough with the claims. But because the don’t make more, it’s not an option. I’m sure they will back some sort of training, but doesn’t mean they will be any more thorough.

jason w.s.

Its all so ironic to me too because about 90% of the reps that ive talked to and ever dealt with at all the local Verizon stores around have all rooted and Rom’d out devices. They all are the ones that have taught me most of what i know about rooting (besides this site ;-)) Pretty funny…

Anonymous

Will the bionic be rootable with custom roms?

DBK

Rootable, most likely. Unlockable, probably not. You should be able to put on ROMs, you just can’t remove Blur.

Anonymous

And they will still track me and throttle or refuse service…

This is actually going to ruin my week, or year, or life.

WHAT TO DO?

DBK

As long as you don’t abuse the network or try to return your phone if you brick it (which would be fraud) then I think you’ll be alright. I don’t think rooting is a problem if you don’t abuse the services.

Anonymous

We should start a petition using our Droid – Life Community power if this gets to out of hand.

Anonymous

We should start a petition using our Droid – Life Community power if this gets to out of hand.

Kwest12

It has been out of hand for a while now

YourMomsTwaht

Rooting apps and Team Black Hat have been pulled from the market, then end is near.

Anonymous

Doesn’t the Blockbuster app (supposedly) do that?

Chrismcan

F that. I paid for it. I will do as I please. If I brick it I brick it. F the manufacturers. They got my money and screwed me out of the rebate (Verizon). I have no remorse. I hope i brick it so I can get rid of my fascinate.

Anonymous

“your data plan only applies to how much data YOUR PHONE uses”

Are you saying that when you tether the phone doesn’t actually consume the data? My opinion is that it does. It then sends it elsewhere after it receives it.

When you are reading a web page on your phone, the phone receives the data and presents it for your eyes.

When you are reading a web page on your computer, tethered to your phone, the phone receives the data and presents it for something other than your eyes.

What’s the difference? Either way, the phone receives the data and outputs it somehow. Whether it outputs it to the screen (reading the web page), the speakers (streaming music) or the usb cable (tethering), shouldn’t make a difference.

Anonymous

Your computer can consume a lot more data (with ease) then your phone can. Carriers prices their plans with the assumption that you’ll be using the data on a certain device.

So that’s why unlimited is $30 on a handset, but to get 5 gigs on a laptop, you need to spend 50.

It matters in the VOLUME that is being consumed. If data had caps, this wouldn’t be an issue. But Verizon offers unlimited handset data, which is why it’s a problem

Even if they are, the community focusing on a single devise is so SO much bigger than the somewhat scattered android community. I have far more confidence that iphones will continue to be hacked then I do for android phones unfortunately.
That in combo with the far more mature os, the hardware integration with the rest if their products, the accessories and the much higher quality apps has me thinking my next phone is going to be an iphone. I honestly never thought I’d say that. Android is off to such a great start and then bam, locked bootloaders and all this bs ruin it.

If I can’t root my phone and do with it as I wish…then I’m better off using Windows Mobile. Better out of the box support and no obnoxious work arounds to play nice with Zune.

Allen

The phones are equipped with the capability and we pay for the phone. Then we pay for data for the phone but are charged to use our own data on the phone. If and when they go to tiered data it definitely would be a rip off. I’m not talking about using 40gb a month but occasional use shouldn’t be charged.

Anonymous

And these changes arn’t for the occasional usage.

The ONLY way to fairly handle data is some sort of tiered/cap system. If you offer unlimited, how you use that data will HAVE to be limited. Only by having a usage cap can you make the data agnostic to usage because the amount consumed in a month will be static.

Anonymous

And these changes arn’t for the occasional usage.

The ONLY way to fairly handle data is some sort of tiered/cap system. If you offer unlimited, how you use that data will HAVE to be limited. Only by having a usage cap can you make the data agnostic to usage because the amount consumed in a month will be static.

Anonymous

Well, my Cable Internet connection ToS says that it only allows ONE computer to be connected.. but I don’t see all of these same people griping about how bad it is to put multiple computers behind a router.

DBK

To a modem directly, yes. Not to the network itself. That’s the problem with these arguments. People think that the phone is a router, when in actuality it’s more like the modem. The hotspots would be the routers.

Anonymous

Hooking up more than one computer to the router (via hub) wouldn’t give you any results unless you were paying for a second public IP address, in which case then you are allowed to have more than one accordint to the ToS.

I have about 18 machines behind my router here at home.

DBK

Not really. I have 5 devices hooked up to my router, and only one IP address is ever used…the router’s. It’s more like one device is hooked up, but it has multiple users.

18 machines? Wow…….do you really need that many?

Anonymous

Yeah, I use them all. I work for a software company, so I’ve got a couple of machines for work. Then I’ve got my own desktop, wife’s laptop, son’s desktop, a media center connected to each television (3 of those), a server for the media center and two Linux servers that perform various functions. Then, I’ve got three Android phones and a BlackBerry connected via Wifi. XBOX 360, Wii, Playstation 3 all connected. And then my VOIP adapter.

That’s an old picture, too. There’s now an additional access point sitting in there.

The router is great… it’s running (ironically) custom firmware. It’s solid as a rock. Much better than the stock Linksys stuff.

DBK

You mean there’s more? O.O

Ah, custom firmware, in that case never mind. 😛

Although my e3000 is a beast 🙂

Anonymous

Definitely more. And two linux servers sitting on the floor. Just can’t see them in the picture.

My two access points are WRT-54GL Linksys boxes running Tomato. It runs very well and I’ve never had any issues with it.

DBK

Nice. Your using high end cables, too, right?

Anonymous

Yeah. Most of the cable came from my old employer. We had people that did cable runs in the hospital where I worked and if there was any less than 600′ in a box they didn’t want it anymore, so I took several boxes of it.

It’s several years old and most of the cabling in my house was done around 2005, but it’s Cat 5E and it’s decent quality stuff. I’ve never had any of it fail… though I’ve wired a couple of the wall boxes backwards a couple of times and had to fix that… but you discover that as you wire it, so it’s all good.

I’ve got two access points in the house for the phones, Wii and wife’s laptop, but everything else runs cabled. Ethernet jacks in every room except the kitchen and bathrooms.

DBK

lol I figured you were running Cat 6E cable. Not bad though.

Same here. When the company I used to be a tech for moved to a new, bigger office, and I set up all the workstations and the network, I was allowed to keep the excess cables, usually 100 footers, and they were a mix of 5E’s and 6E’s. Don’t you love those kind of perks? 😛

Anonymous

Yeah, I sure do. And for my company, anything less than 600′ was worthless. I have the boxes here, but put my own connectors and wall jacks in. Most rooms have two in the wall jack, but some rooms have more. My office has about eight. Service loops behind most.

DBK

My company was less picky. I scored so much gear because of that move, and was able to make them work better then they did at that office. 🙂

I was thinking of putting some wall jacks in, too. Since my router is downstairs, it’s hard to connect directly to it.

I also got some not-so-little things, half of which I still have. The other half turned into a not-so-little profit 🙂

Anonymous

Yeah. Most of the cable came from my old employer. We had people that did cable runs in the hospital where I worked and if there was any less than 600′ in a box they didn’t want it anymore, so I took several boxes of it.

It’s several years old and most of the cabling in my house was done around 2005, but it’s Cat 5E and it’s decent quality stuff. I’ve never had any of it fail… though I’ve wired a couple of the wall boxes backwards a couple of times and had to fix that… but you discover that as you wire it, so it’s all good.

I’ve got two access points in the house for the phones, Wii and wife’s laptop, but everything else runs cabled. Ethernet jacks in every room except the kitchen and bathrooms.

DBK

Nice. Your using high end cables, too, right?

DBK

Not really. I have 5 devices hooked up to my router, and only one IP address is ever used…the router’s. It’s more like one device is hooked up, but it has multiple users.

18 machines? Wow…….do you really need that many?

Anonymous

If they don’t want us to root then stop putting all your ads and MOTO BLUR, Bloatware crap. Give us the option to remove those apps you force on us!!!!

Anonymous

The only thing good that came from me rooting my DX was the gingerbread!

Anonymous

The phone companies make a grip of money, they don’t loose crap from us rooting a phone that we pay for. You wanna fix this, suspend the insurance and let us pay 50% retail. I’ve used my insurance twice for the past 12 years. Every year we pay 96.00 for insurance, if you take care of your phone that’s 200.00 towards a new upgrade. If you don’t then you have to pay. There done.

My thoughts? There should at least be a setting that turns off skins, added UIs and other garbage (and turns them off for real!). If there’s at least that then i’d give up root.

Anonymous

LOL I feel like Jesse James, and like Bon Jovi 1980’s song “I am Wanted, On my Steel Horse I Ride, Wanted, Dead or Alive” Take that OEM’s 😛

Anonymous

LOL I feel like Jesse James, and like Bon Jovi 1980’s song “I am Wanted, On my Steel Horse I Ride, Wanted, Dead or Alive” Take that OEM’s 😛

Allen

I paid top dollar for a phone with hotspot capability and I pay for data each month. Seems to me that we are getting double charged. Am I way off base her?

Allen

I paid top dollar for a phone with hotspot capability and I pay for data each month. Seems to me that we are getting double charged. Am I way off base her?

YourMomsTwaht

How are you getting double charged? You are paying one fee for your phones data. You are paying an optional fee for other devices data via your phone.

Anonymous

It’s all the same data, your just running thru the devise you want to use…

DBK

No it is not. Using the data through a phone is different than using it through another device. The network is only meant to work with phones and tablets, for the most part. Anything else will end up eating more data and bog down the network.

Anonymous

Then that shouldn’t be a problem with 4G since it’s SOOOO fast!!

DBK

Based on that response, I’m going to stop after this since it’s obviously pointless to keep arguing with you.

When you have hundreds of people (The 2%) using hundreds of gigs of data at once, the network is going to take a hit regardless of how fast it is. And if you are in a high traffic area, it’s just that much worse. When used properly, the network is crazy fast. But when you start abusing it, then it costs money to get the network running smoothly again, which results in higher prices (or more fees) for us to make that money back.

Anonymous

I disagree.

YourMomsTwaht

No it’s not the same. You are paying $29.99 a month for your phones data ONLY. If you want it to send the data bandwidth to another device’tethering’ it costs more. Not a hard concept to follow.

Anonymous

It’s the same URMOMSTWAHT…..

Anonymous

It’s the same URMOMSTWAHT…..

Anonymous

Not at all, they are double charging, that’s exactly what it is….

YourMomsTwaht

Team Black Hat app has been pulled from the market.,

Wmsco51

My thoughts —phones should be sold by manufacturer and phone co. sell services. That would give us the power of our wallet. I would buy the latest tech and buy the cheapest services and avoid long term contracts.

Kwest12

This + fragmentation + lack of “just works” solutions + lack of seamless integration with other hardware = the end of the android community. It’s not gonna be long before we’ll be able to customize iphones as much as androids. If the quality of the apps and the fragmentation problems haven’t been fixed by the time android phones are completely locked down, almost all the android modders will jump ship.

Lets be honest, I love my droid x but I have severe iphone envy daily because of the higher quality apps, the extremely minimal amount of issues and the seemingly endless hardware integration solutions. The only reason I am STILL an android supporter is b/c of hope for future phones (specifically my ability to actually mod them like an og droid). If there isn’t a phone around that I’ll be able to heavily mod (after my 2 yrs is up with the droid x), then there is no question that I’m jumping ship (yes, to the iphone, gasp) unless the android os has matured MUCH more than I assume it will have by then.

Wmsco51

Customization, overclock, updates is the only reason for root by us tards!! Why? NO CHOICES —UPDATES ARE TO SLOW from release

Out of curiosity, how many out there, with rooted phones, would forgo rooting if the manufacturers released more high end phones with stock Android? I had a rooted OG Droid and absolutely loved it. I admit that I switched out ROMS almost daily at some points. Loved it.

I have recently gone to an Atrix and I love the phone, but detest Blur…there’s a bunch of crap on there I don’t use…I’d much prefer stock android simply to get rid of the bloat. I run LPP so I don’t have to see the blur elements, but I’m still annoyed that they are there.

Give me a phone with specs like the Atrix and put stock android on there…you can bet I’ll be snatching that baby up ASAP.

I don’t know. I have a DX, running Liberty 2.0 at the moment. I have rarely used wireless tether at all, and didn’t *need* it when I did – nor have I needed my phone replaced at all…so I’m not doing anyone any harm. I’d be more inclined to buy a high spec device that was stock than skinned, but I don’t know if it would make me feel fine with not rooting.

vzw has screwed its customers for so long now, that most people want to root and get every penny they sent/spend on their devices. a lot may be out of spite.they are not losing money. i don’t care what anyone says. look at their balance sheet sometime. ha. bet devs will find ways around it all.

Spursrchamps2007

So I have heard a lot of people talking about the supreme court decision that allows us to “root” our phones and decided to investigate because I wasn’t aware of it. The one supreme court case I could find dismissed an appeal by AT&T and T-Mobile to block a ruling by a Californian court that opened the door for customer to sue the respective providers. Now I believe that ultimately this was accomplished through arbitration but I could be wrong. The big “win” for us rooters actually came from the library of congress and this exemption they allowed, “Computer programs that enable wireless telephone handsets to execute software applications, where circumvention is accomplished for the sole purpose of enabling interoperability of such applications, when they have been lawfully obtained, with computer programs on the telephone handset.” (http://www.copyright.gov/1201/) (per the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.) Now what that basically protects us from (i believe) is Verizon from locking down our service simply because we are rooted. Now when you get the “lawfully obtained” wording, that could be debatable about whether or not tethering could even be a violation. The TOS never attacks tethering, just that we can’t add undue stress to the network, so verizon would ultimately have to prove you violated this aspect of the TOS.

The one thing, however, which does play to the carriers hands though is something (once again not sure of the validity of this) i read from the following website (http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/26/library-of-congress-adds-dmca-exception-for-jailbreaking-or-root/). The state (in my summary of it) they are allowed to block us out, they just cant sue us for trying to break in. Also they further go on to state, that rooting instructions could be deemed illegal, so while it may not be illegal for us to unlock our phone, but developers could be in violation. “he DMCA still broadly forbids distributing to the public any “technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof” that’s primarily designed to break access controls, so Apple can always go after the Dev Team directly”

Here, http://bit.ly/fuxL22. Any of the top links will show you the case that almost everyone refers to and the case that allows what you said was the big win for rooters.

Beng8686

Official Google phone 4 life. No more Droid branded phones. F*** you Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint.

Booboolala2000

Totally agree. I have the TBolt and will likely be my last purchase for the next couple of years. Will be interesting to see where Google takes its 1gig network in the future. I hope it turns into a communications company. All of their devices will be unlocked. But that would be ten years away at best. I have to XOOM and have not unlocked it yet. Waiting for the 4GLTE upgrade before that. And the fact that they made that device easier to hack is a sign. I have to think that if Sprint offered fully unlocked devices they would grow their business. I would dump Verizon and it’s crazy fast download speeds for that, maybe.

…android growing more powerful, less user friendly and less open. I’m sensing them becoming more and more like the dreaded fruit company, sad but true fact maybe if they don’t get back to there roots which they came from another power will rise….

I agree with you, I use pandora for atleast 3 hours a day 5 days a week and I get around 1.5 gig month w/ pandora at high setting also

Apostrafee

Bottom line here is they are freakin phones man, its not the end of the world. I love having my phone rooted and i love the freedom to do as i please but really? Besides that there is always a way around and/or through everything

Ven727

This really sucks. Everyone can complain all they want and point fingers all they want but it will not change the direction things are going. The fact is yes the handset is yours but the network belongs to the provider. I hope that this prompts Nexus devices on every carrier released consistently. The carriers have the money we can fight it but I do not see us winning. I am glad I picked up the TBOLT. Maybe I am wrong but I see us having to put up with it.

Sounds like it’s about time for that data-only mobile VoIP/SIP, Google Wireless revolution the Nexus One was supposed to cause.

Mbaker

I only use root for two things, and well one of those is kinda mutli part. when I want to backup my phone I want to back EVERYTHING up. Program seetings, data, Game progress and all that good stuff. Can’t do that without root. Or at least not that I have found The other is I don’t like all the Ads so I block them. I don’t wireless teather no need. but the freedom to make a full backup and restore is nice. And most of these carries don’t care. I bet they make a FULL backup of their servers….I just like the freedom to do that..here’s to hopping This will always be possible.

Hellsbound_angel

How did this turn into another argument about what “unlimited data” is or isn’t?

DBK

Because many of the arguments on here against the lockdown are based on that concept. Unfortunately, many of the posters making those arguments have no idea what the “unlimited data” they are using to make the argument really means. And when someone tries to point that out, the “unlimited data” argument ensues.

Tom

This should not happen. They should not be allowed to block rooting. Know why? The Supreme Court ruled that it is our right to do with our phones as we will, so long as we are doing no illegalities. Tethering is technically illegal, because it goes against the contract we all signed. Installing paid apps for free, illegal. Cool, now track those people and stop them. There are plenty of people who root their phones to stay up to date with google’s firmware through custom roms, or to back-up their apps through titanium back-up or to push the phone to its limit by overclocking. Installing google’s firmware is illigitimate? I could have sworn Android is an open platform, and thus NO variation of android is illegal.

Here is what should happen… Track the people who are doing illegal acts and lock down their phones, and take action, probably legal would be best. Notify interested parties and take it from there (like say developers). Or just start charging for tethering as they are already using the service which they should be paying for. No iteration of firmware is illegal, because android is open, so that is bs. We are still buying their devices and clicking on ads. So they are losing money on their own skin like Sense or Blur. Easy solution… GIVE THE CHOICE! When you boot up the phone allow users to choose to use that or vanilla android. Or save some money and don’t develop these skins in the first place. Then you can send out updates for both, the stock vanilla android and the skinned, targeting who uses what. Can’t be that hard to do. I’m fairly certain there are users who like sense and blur and whatever samsung uses. As for warranty… Track who roots the phones, and send them a notice that their warranty is void and will no longer be charged for it if they are going through a third party insurer. Then if the phone breaks, they must buy a new phone. Simple solutions! Do not take our right to modify devices we bought and paid for with the understanding that they were open devices.

What this is boiling down to is this: I won’t be purchasing another smartphone, Android or otherwise. I have my OG DROID rooted for performance reasons, and nothing else. My laptop doesn’t play nice with tethering, so I can honestly say I have never used it. I would rather invest a few hundred $$$ into a small, portable laptop or tablet and suck wi-fi wherever than deal with 1 million restrictions on what I do with what I am paying for.

And yes, you can say ‘buy a dev phone’ all day long, but as Kellex mentions, it won’t be a ‘fruitful’ purchase as the specs won’t compare to a prison phone.

me sad now. 🙁 well the next phone i get will have a bangin’ ui so i wont have to root to get a better one. 🙂 i say that because the 2.2 blur is really stupid in alot of ways while the 2.3 blur is good enough for me. so as long as i get the 2.3 i should be good until my upgrade.

TheTinker

Data is not unlimited. It caps out at 5gb right?

Rickkane

I won’t be buying a bionic if it is locked like my DX is. I will have a TBolt. As I’m sure by then vzw will have some good incentives, and I’m sure there will be plenty of rims for it by then too.

Rickkane

Roms, oops.

Raven

I am using a rooted stock Droid 2 Global and I rooted for only 2 reasons: to use Titanium Backup to make decent backups of application data (and restore them from my Droid 1 when I switched) and AutoStarts to manage which apps start up at boot. These are 2 system level applications that should be available by default but aren’t. I don’t ROM or theme or tether. If Google/Android and the manufacturers would just give us the basic access to things such as these I would probably never bother to root.

Porschephile2k3

Another reason to root would be to use Drocap2 or Shoot Me to take snap shots of your screen. There’s also a VPN app I use to connect to Cisco type VPN concentrators.

I don’t tether much. But the fact that VZW wants to try and detect and block users that root their phone is NOT acceptable. If they must. Block tethering. But just rooting alone. If They start that I’m leaving. I bought a phone knowing I could have a open phone.

Robert M

Google should start their own cell phone company and keep it truley open network they got the money!!!!

mptrh336

Didn’t the carriers successfully lobby a couple years back to shut down analog TV so that they could “bring broadband internet to rural America”? Im not very educated on the matter but I know that the government furnished millions of set top boxes to many people who couldnt afford them which in my opinion creates a matter of a PUBLIC nature. If these large companies would use their wireless networks to actually provide what they promised at a reasonable rate they wouldn’t have to worry so much about theft of service. Secondly the wireless spectrum will provide much more bandwidth than any wired technology of today. Check into it. I don’t feel any pain for the wireless carriers. I pay more to them than any other service in my home. They SHOULD provide a truly unlimited option to whatever devices I see fit. I would gladly write the check.

Anonymous

that spectrum still needs fiber to back it up, which costs billions to lay down.

And “truly unlimited” service will never work as long as there are asshats who abuse the network.

Anonymous

That’s exactly my point. Don’t market a service as “unlimited” if you’re not willing to put up with people using all of it. It’s not abuse as you call it if it’s advertised as that. Stop calling them unlimited, and start tiering the access rates and all these arguments (from both sides) disappear. But as long as providers try to make money by overselling, they will keep crying about abusers who are just using what they were given…

DBK

Your assuming that a phone company’s network acts like a wifi network, which it doesn’t. If you utilize only the phone for your data usage, then the service would be unlimited (the transfer rates are smaller and the date is more compressed). But when you start to tether and have another device, that was never meant to utilize the network, use that same data, the transfers rates and the amounts increase significantly. Thus, the network gets bogged down and those who use it properly get, well, screwed.

So basically, Verizon is telling the truth, for the most part, when the network is utilized properly. But when that 2% goes above and beyond what the network was made, and intended, for, then they are using more then what they pay for, and thus stealing. Therefore, MennoMobile’s point is valid.

I don’t tether much. Most of what I do is root my phone and use rooted apps. I just like to have back-ups. I just want full access. The fact that VZW TRYS to detect and block if a phone is rooted. Tethering block ok (if they have to choose). But I’ll leave VZW if I discover they block me for having root.

I don’t tether much. Most of what I do is root my phone and use rooted apps. I just like to have back-ups. I just want full access. The fact that VZW TRYS to detect and block if a phone is rooted. Tethering block ok (if they have to choose). But I’ll leave VZW if I discover they block me for having root.

This issue here is your phone has the ability to let other devices use its data. If you are using your phone to tether you are not using some other magical “computer” data. The data is still being pulled from your phone. If the companies don’t like it don’t carry phones that let you tether. Don’t say oh you have unlimited data, but if you want to use your phone as it was intended to be used then you have to pay extra for “different” data. This whole point is moot anyway. Smartphone=computer. So the argument that computers use more data than your phone does is just stupid. It is easier to multitask on a bigger screen, with a keyboard and mouse which can lead to more data consumption, but as phones progress they will to. This is the carriers trying to double charge people and then being pissed that intelligent people cut into their “profits”

Anonymous

You can’t make a data device that DOESN’T have the ability to tether (or can’t have it hacked on)

Someone answer this, please. I’m not sure, but when you pay extra to use tethering feature on your phone, is that still unlimited? If so, how is that any different than using an app like WiFi Tether, without paying the extra money?

Also, when I got my plan from Verizon, I got the unlimited messaging + data, but still had to play the extra money from unlimited data for my OG Droid (I also have a couple of other non-smartphones on this plan). I’m just saying.

Anonymous

Extra tethering fee has a hard cap (2GB on verizon, or 5 if you have one of the older plans)

Wow, that is pretty small compared to how much you are paying. You have to get the $30 data plan for your smartphone, then play an extra $20 just to use 2GB. That’s not right, but I see where you were getting at before about customers breaking the TOS. Two wrongs don’t make a right. It’s not just Verizon, though. The whole system is corrupt.

Anonymous

I did. Disques can only embed a conversation so deeply before it kicks out the start of a new thread.

Anonymous

At least thats what id do

Anonymous

At least thats what id do

Anonymous

And again, so what? The issue is what you’re purchasing. If you buy smartphone data currently, you’re buying it FOR that handset, as per the TOS. You don’t agree with that, then DONT sign the contract. Signing the contract and then breaking it doesn’t make carriers willing to try and change their rules, refusing to pay them DOES.

Anonymous

in Regards to IRCMAXELL….dude why not skip all the legal mumbo jumbo and just dl stuff on ur computer and put it on ur phone? then they cant say well u used our service to acquire this program…u can then say “no bitch i didnt, i downloaded it from my computer and put it on my phone” “thank you have a nice day”

Anonymous

And that has nothing to do with this discussion. At all. We’re talking TETHERING here, and we’re talking about the idea of “unlimited” data.

The OP is right. If he pays his money for “unlimited” data he can use it how he sees fit. Whether it be on his phone or FROM HIS PHONE TO HIS COMPUTER. I mean 200GB is a hell of a lot, but guess what unlimited is more. So all that hummer and civic b.s. is just that. Please tell me how you get a “limit” from “Unlimited”. If I pay $750 for a phone that has a tethering feature, and I pay my bill every month, I will use it how I want, when I want. It seems like everyone has forgotten why cell companies are getting so worked up about tethering. It’s not because people are using to much bandwidth, its because they want you to buy a mobile broadband card with 5GB of data for $59.99/MO. So people can come off of that liberal bull about using data and how they “respect” the system because its crap. You’re just mad because you are locked into a contract for 2yrs and can only use 5GB, while Billy is tethering away. Don’t be mad because you found out about rooting 2rys after it was thought off.

Anonymous

And so it’s not an issue here. Illegal downloading is.

The problem is YOU’RE trying to frame the issue in such a way that you downloading lectures (legally) using your phone is equivalent to you tethering your phone to your computer. It’s not.

what happened to the court case stating they had to allow root access however don’t have to warranty the device after? Wouldn’t it make it somewhat illegal for verizon to track these devices then in terms of discrimination?

Anonymous

The sheer amount of devil’s advocacy on this topic is astounding.

You people are idiots. You’re essentially arguing that “VERIZON SAID YOU CAN ONLY USE DATA ON YOUR HANDSET!!!”.

So? Then the TOS is shitty. If you pay for unlimited data, you should be able to do as you please with the data.

If power user tethering is really crushing the network (which is bullshit, they are pushing bits around with electricity), then raise the price for Unlimited data, or make Unlimited data “Limited” to 5 gigs or something realistic.

If people want to tether and then pay overages, that’s their business.

The idea that I can subscribe to a music service and download music, nonstop, 24 hours a day unlimited but I can’t jump on my laptop through my phone is ridiculous.

RedXander

It’s not the mechanics of the phone contract. 5 gigabytes is more than the average person uses. It’s the politics behind such a move. Verizon would lose more customers than they want to by taking it to tiered services. Look at the Sprint commercials: “Last time I checked unlimited means unlimited… not metered.” It turns into a blame game where people want the more appealing offer not because they need it but because… well people are dumb. My argument is don’t take away my root access for those people.

I tether. VERY SELDOMLY! I also take every update. I feel however it’s not just tethering VZW and other carriers what to stop. They want to control the device. Block you from removing the apps they install.

All good things come to an end. The only thing that bothers me about it is all the back end $ they make in the form of bloat ware. I pay good money for a device and contract but get stuck with some crappy app I don’t use or want.
I have rooted my device, but it wasn’t to tether.. it was more about customization. The skins are getting better, but still not to everyone’s liking.
Hey it’s not the end of the world though. There are a lot of awesome devices coming out with blazing fast speed.. and I’d still rather have a Android than *phone!!

Njd32

The dev phones better have some sexy ass specs

MachineGun68

Funniest part about this whole argument is….for $20 bucks Verizon WILL allow you to tether…Oh, so now their network can handle it. Funny how money changes the argument doesn’t it? I feel an excess of $100 a month for my phone/data is sufficient. I’ll cheat until caught.

Anonymous

That $20 gives you a limited data pool that is SEPARATE from the one on your device.

I can’t believe I’m saying this. But,iIf we ever reach a point that we can’t root our Android devices, I’ll just get an i*hone. In my estimation, an i*hone on Verizon’s network is better than an Android phone sacked with Blur or Sense and all of Verizons bloatware.

Anonymous

Ditto, seems like a lot of people feel the same on this forum. Is Kellex going to start a new forum at that time under the guise “Xellek”?

Anonymous

i whole heartedly agree. i’ve been on the og droid since it’s release, but if this crazy lockdown comes into fruition…i just might have to get an iphone.

RedXander

As it turns out, not everyone roots their phone in order to tether. It seems to me like Verizon wants to offer an “unlimited” data plan in order to shut Dan Hessy (CEO of Sprint) up and not look like the bad guy. They don’t want to make a bad PR move and move to tiered data services. By pointing at root users they can put a face to “the bad guy that ruined it for everyone.” I’ve rooted since the first day I had my Droid. Do I use it recklessly and take up 100 gb of data in a month? no. I use it responsibly when I need internet access on my portable device. How often do I tether? maybe an hour in any given month.

The main reason I root is just to customize my phone; to get all the cool updates that Verizon doesn’t push out until they add on their bloatware. Do I want to be able to delete the stupid apps that Verizon throws on my phone? yes. Do I want to be able to overclock my phone in order to get more out of it? Yes but I understand the risks and don’t try to scam Verizon if it breaks.

It seems to me that Verizon just need to be more prudent as to who they attack. I don’t mind if they go after the guy that torrents 200 gb of data (it seems pretty obvious). I mean they’re already tracking data usage by user. If Verizon just wants to track who roots in order to void a warranty? I’m okay with that. If I break my phone, it’s my fault.

In the end… who knows what Verizon will do but I think they can do it in a just manner that serves all their users…. rooted and otherwise.

Except Verizon already announced tiered data plans so that isn’t the reason. It’s all about the bottom line. If people are removing bloatware, those companies don’t see the returns they expected and either pay verizon less or cancel. If you teether for free and use large amounts of data, that hurts the bottom line as well. it’s all about $$$$

Guest

i’m just waiting with my OG Droid for a dual-core with full access. i’m hoping it’s the Galaxy S2 and that it’s out by May 27th so i can record my vacation in 1080p. if enough people stop buying encrypted phones, then maybe they’ll stop. if they’re having some kind of problem with returns, then they should tell people to bring their phone to the store so someone can check it.

NewsWorthy

Best Buy’s Buyback Program looks better and better. I would rather pay full price for the phone and upgrade every year. If I pay $600 for a phone, I would get approximately $240 (40%) for it after a year. The old 1 year VZW contracts would add about $100 to the price of the phone. Therefore a Thunderbolt for example would cost $350 on a 1 year contract. After my initial investment, I would basically be paying the 1 year contract price for a new phone every year. $350/ year sounds steep but my Droid X is somewhat obsolete already and I got it on release day. I can’t imagine holding on to it for another year.

NewsWorthy

Actually, I would only need to do the full retail price every other year because I would be eligible for upgrade pricing after 2 years. Hmmmmmm.

I think you would only be eligible for upgrade pricing if you were on a 2 yr contract, not 1 yr.

Anonymous

Hey so I would like to point out there is one missing from this conversation and that is the effect of that latest android market virus outbreak. I’ve never heard it discussed so I want to bring it up again. That virus spread through apps in the android marketplace and the various carrier marketplaces that could be easily downloaded by unsuspecting victims. The thing is that virus rooted your phone in during its destructive path of infecting your phone and costing you money.

It is all good for carriers to try and make it harder to root, lock bootloaders and generally make life difficult for those who want to have fun on Android. But if the possibility exists of viruses and malware apps spreading through the channels they provide that can give that level of control over the devices they infect, then claiming you don’t know what rooting is and didn’t know your phone had all this stuff done to it is a valid excuse. You can claim innocence as long as there is a viable way you can be innocent.

Hell there could even be a virus out there that roots and then makes your phone always available as an open wireless tether in the cause of being malicious and sabotaging people’s data plans. How would they prove you intentionally tethered if that turned up on the market?

Anyway I could be totally wrong in this but I never heard discussion of what this might mean in this battle of carriers vs rooters so I was hoping to see what you guys thought.

I suspect that they are less worried about people tethering for free than they are about the blaotware removal and ad removal. If advertisers think that their software or ads are being bypassed they are not going to pay as much and that is big money for the providers.

Wireless Fool

Valid argument, but I’ve never once opened a bloatware program, so what’s the difference between that and me deleting it from my phone?

I can understand completely them wanting to prevent getting ripped off (free tethering), but if they expect me to sit by while they shove programs like City ID and Cordy down my throat then they are sadly mistaken.

Sage

I would rather have a rooted phone that is several years old than an unrootable phone that is new.

Maddroiduser

I’m getting tired of people referring to rooted tethering as illegal use or “stealing data”. You do realize that by being charged for the use of tethering you’re paying for the same data TWICE! And exactly how are you stealing the data? Isn’t that the same data that the phone would download if you were browsing the web on the phone instead of sending it to another device? The web page looks exactly the same on my droid as if I was “stealing data” and sending it to my laptop. How about we get together and get the cell phone companies to realize that we’re already paying for data and that we don’t want to pay for it again.

If it was your home internet connection would you think it was okay to be be charged for every device you have connected at home?

I’m sure warranty issues are a big part of it, and they could solve that problem by providing an unlocked phone with a restore CD that simply flashes back to stock in the most simple way possible, that even someone that barely knows how to open the CD tray on their computer can 1-click fix a “brick”. Then both sides are happy. They don’t get warranty calls/have to fork out replacements, and we get unlocked phones to do with as we please.

I have yet to hear of anybody “bricking” their device…well at least the OG droid. That is what RSLite is used for. The individuals that work at verizon need to be properly trained on it though.

Adam Metzner

He’s said download. Streaming does use less data, but when you have phones that act the same as computers why is it any different downloading 1gig to my phone or downloading 1gig to my pc by the way of tether? Its the same data that I am paying for.
And if anyone here is feeling bad for company’s that make billions on us then have the gull to say were are stealing from them. You are blind!

Anonymous

No, I don’t feel bad for them. I am angry at people who do this because EVERYONE suffers. What carriers will turn around and do is drop unlimited data ENTIRELY. And instead of going to buckets, they’ll go to a PPU model where each function costs something extra (so tethering is it’s own separate charge from Smartphone data, and USB sticks a whole other contract, etc.) instead of me buying 30gigs of data and using it on however many registered devices in whatever way I please.

You’re shooting your own position in the face by trying to defend illegal tethering like this. You’re NOT paying for a set amount (GB) of data on Verizon or Sprint (or on older Tmobile and ATT plans) You’re paying for unlimited HANDSET data.

Skirting those rules will only make the consumers suffer. You’re not sticking it to the man, you’re stabbing yourself in the back.

AlwaysSunny

Nexus!

Anonymous

Hopefully Google’s new found controlling stance will help remedy this. Google is in favor of rooting, so maybe they’ll keep manufacturers from having a completely locked down bootloader or at least leaving the bootloader locked but allow easy rooting, just not ROM switching. As long as Google fights to protect the freedoms of the users, I’m okay with them taking a more controlling stance.

what about when connecting through wifi and using your cable connection. That same theory applies. Difference is that your cable/dsl connection costs the same amount per month, depending on plan, and those companies are not limiting how many devices or what you can have connected on it.

what about when connecting through wifi and using your cable connection. That same theory applies. Difference is that your cable/dsl connection costs the same amount per month, depending on plan, and those companies are not limiting how many devices or what you can have connected on it.

Anonymous

Because those are Bucket based services and not device based ones.

Sean27030

don’t think i’d call it “Bucket based” services… my billing is specifice to MY modem ID number on my cable broadband… how’s that different from my data connetion going through my phones esn/meid…. each device is pretty much it’s just an acess point… wireless or wired my phone has a specific IP address just as my cable modem has a specific IP … by your logic Time warner/clear wire could charge you extra to hook a router to a wireless modem in your house on their wirless highspeed service… would you support that?

Once 4g is in my city, I am considering dropping my voice plan and going to data only.

Richard

Those on VZW and are shocked, how the hell can you be? they were locking phones down harder than a fat guy can eat a bucket of chicken… You clearly could see that all the good manufactures for phones stopped giving or making nice newer phones for VZW and were giving them to other carriers because of this… I will be damned if say HTC makes a phone that can do everything but have a baby and cook for you… then VZW gets it and says oh well you will have to pay to listen to mp3’s because your phone will only play wma’s… You know, if you want change then go to the phone manufacturers and demand they not agree to VZW or any other carriers demands… why should they? if no one sold VZW phones or good ones, then everyone would switch right? well lets do that then… Go to the manufacture and say we as a whole will not buy your “brand of phones” if you do lock them down… you see, the manufactures don’t give a rats ass who they sell to, as long as they make money… carriers like VZW don’t give a shit period which is why all this is coming about, its about money and how can they make you pay for more crap that they don’t, kinda like the government… At some point you have to make a stand, and in the end it is up to use to either have or not have carrier service like VZW or to buy or not to buy phones so, don’t get upset when you see a company trying to make more off you than they need…

guest

P3 said it was all the major carriers going down this road, not just big red

Sounds like you hate big red and another thing att alreadynsent an email to people’illegally tethering

jason w.s.

This is true. My buddy using AT&T pulled his iphone out and turned his tether on to use my laptop, and within minutes he had an email from AT&T saying to please call and set up a tethering plan IMMEDIATELY… So yeah, these carriers have found ways to monitor the customers and see exactly what were doing with our devices. Big bro is always watchin…lol

Anonymous

I blame all of this on users who abused tethering features once they rooted. And making rooting easier (i.e. one-click methods) only added to this. I’m not upset with Verizon (or any other carrier for that matter). They offer a product and too many figured out a way to get more of said product without paying for it. Add to that the HUGE number of rooted users who messed up their phones and subsequently lied about it when making warranty claims (read Androidforums or Droidforums and you’ll find many such instances) and I can totally see why the carriers are doing this.

Anonymous

Or they could go with the intelligent and fair way of handling that. Put in REASONABLY PRICED data tiers and deny warranty claims for hacked devices. I know what you’re thinking, the reps in store can’t possible tell whether a devices is rooted, right? When it’s send back to be refurbed and resold they could charge the customer if it turns out to be the problem.

Damn, that really does suck. But I can see where they are coming from. Users who use their rooted phones for illegal purposes should not be allowed a phone to begin with.

But the users who just want full customization(like installing roms/themes, etc), we are the users who will be most hurt by this.

Ouch…this really does blow…if this really does happen in the future, where it will be extremely hard to root.

MK17

Seriously, if wireless tether is there big problem I will gladly take a capped plan and unlocked device where I can use my tether up until i reach my cap. I personally don’t go over 1GB and if I had to watch it I could easily use all kinds of wifi networks. This of course would have to be coupled with a lower bill or I would be furious.

The whole wireless tether is really a moot point though as I can almost as easily do BT tether or wired tether from a free app in the market place w/o violating terms of service.

Tim242

Only problem with tethering being pegged as the main reason for this, most tethering is done by non-rooted users with Easy Tether or PdaNet.

Anonymous

exactly. A bigger reason is the fact that too many users try rooting their phone without understanding the process. (such as flashing Cyanogen Rom themes over a BuglessBeast ROM) and then when it fails they take it to a store and demand a NEW phone, without even trying to flash back to stock (most would stare blankly at that sentence)

The problem with rooting isn’t that it’s easy, it’s that people are too lazy to understand the basics of the process before they start tinkering with the code. It would be like trying to “pimp” out your car without understanding the basics of car mainainence. All you end up with is a broken car and a ton of “spare parts.”

Anonymous

Just out of curiosity, do we have any proof of people doing that? I’ve never heard of it happening.

Anonymous

Read any forum on rooting under the help section. That’s all the proof you need.

this is retarded. Seriously. Why ever listen to p3droid. he’s only a middleman for handing out stolen ROM packs. If that’s not bad enough, he charges for you to download them. Charging for stolen property. Done deal, don’t listen to this clown.

Ill keep my HTC TBolt thank you very much. They locked the bootloader so Verizon would shut up, but i doubt encryption like those dimwit people at Motorola will never touch HTC devices.

dannyjedi

This is why I switched to Android from Iphone in the First place.
This is why I will be going back to Iphone when Iphone 5 comes out.
Sorry, VZW customer service is great, but I didn’t realize that dealing with MOTO would be worse than apple.

the whole idea of this is driven by the carriers….I still see moto as having a better product than apple, even if they are locked down

STiK

Once you modify your device, the warranty is voided.
Once you attempt to turn said device in under warranty, you are committing fraud.
Yes you can do whatever you want with your device. The carrier, per the TOS, can prevent you from using that device on their network.

Any questions? Read that document you probably didn’t read but signed anyway 🙂

Football4lifeson

I don’t know if anyone else has thought of this, I haven’t looked through all the comments, but with the recent news that Google is pushing manufactures to update more quickly, this makes perfect sense. One of the main reasons to root/hack your phone is to get the new version of android on your device before the assholes at Samsung or HTC finally release an update. I don’t know about any of you, but I have consistently ran the newest version on android on my DX one to two months before it was ever released officially, and I am currently on 2.3.3. This is a sad sad day for the android community.

Anonymous

You make something idiot proof, someone will make a better idiot. Simple as that. As things change people will inevitably adapt and overcome.

Dsim91

This is so like big greedy corporations always looking were they are losing a penny, well I say get bent its not long before we have a country wide wifi network a,nd unlocked phones running on it, then we will all sit back and watch the telco’s sink like the greedy bastards they are .

Anonymous

I hate to be the one to say it, but the main reason the majority of people root their phones is to strip it down to AOSP (or as close as they can get it) to make their phones run as smoothly as the i*hones do. I mean I’m a huge advocate for the Android operating system, but I’m sorry, the i*hone just runs smoother. If this is the direction that we’re heading, I may have to switch to the dark side just to get a phone without the bloat. (pending there is a 4g option)

Carriers want to kill tethering as it affects profits. If AT&T doesn’t care about blocking stolen iPhones from their network – they don’t really care about blocking rooted phones. They want recurring revenue, not a user exodus.

The FCC won’t do squat about a rumor. Until someone has some proof – this is all meaningless.

I am a Sprint HTC EVO 4G user. I pay for 4G in my service area, which does not support 4G. I do not pay for wireless tethering, but I steal the service because my phone is rooted.

I don’t want to carry a larger Sprint OverDrive device on me at all times, but if Sprint forces me to pay for wireless tethering (beyond what I already pay extra for 4G and do not even receive), then I will move my contract to a Sprint OverDrive device, build a battery pack and carry case for it, and turn my Sprint “phone service” off. Then I can just run my HTC EVO 4G through WiFi and connect to the Internet (where I have access to Google Voice for both making and receiving both phone calls and SMS messages) via the Sprint OverDrive.

Sprint OverDrive (and the Rover Puck) are $50/month for unlimited data. There is no wireless tethering charge. This is the way it should be — mobile Internet at a near-affordable price. Mind you, I believe that $50/month for unlimited is still too much, but at least it’s not the even higher rates that other carriers are forcing their customers to pay.

I hope that Sprint remains reasonable. I am fine to not have to pay for insurance for my phone (that’s another scam) — but I do not want overage or wireless tethering fees and will always find ways to avoid them.

However, right now I am very happy. I will likely be purchasing a Sprint ECHO this month — and I intend on rooting this device (and supporting the development of new ROMs, kernels, and bootloaders with my advanced reverse engineering and programming knowledge). I do not believe that Kyocera or Sprint will be able to stop me.

Tim242

You do not pay extra for 4G. The $10 fee was never for 4G. To prove that, they now charge it for ALL smartphones.

Beejay686

Only time will tell. I personally hope this is BS but I feel that even if the device is locked down the devs will be able to crack it or work around it. I’m always gonna be an Android user but again, I sure hope this is BS.

I know its not…I’m just referring to when it was… and who knows Apple could appeal at anytime

Tfasdf8

So what evidence does this guy have that all this is true? If they are gonna release dev phones for each carrier, whats gonna stop them from tethering and the likes?

Tfasdf8

So what evidence does this guy have that all this is true? If they are gonna release dev phones for each carrier, whats gonna stop them from tethering and the likes?

Interstellarmind

Phone manufacturers are totally shooting themselves in the foot by allowing this. For example, I just ditched my Droid X in favor of a thunderbolt. Why? because HTC isn’t as locked-down as Moto (yet!). This means, I’ll probably not get the bionic and jsut wait for HTC’s dual core offering (on verizon, of course).

bottom line: manufacturers who lockdown will not get my money. manufacturers need to man up to carriers and not let them lockdown their phones… because they will lose more business in the first place.

also, contrary to what maunfacturers may think, offerring rootable devices WILL build loyalty. that’s why i stuck with moto as long as i did (i had an OG and DX). sure, I may not buy EVERY new phone the company will put out, but my great user experience, made possible by rooting, would make me stick with the brand that gave me that good user experience. because here’s the thing, it’s not the software that matters, manufacturers. it’s the hardware. android will take care of the software for you, you worry about the hardware. and if you clamp down on rooting, etc, then guess what? i will jump ship to the next manufacturer that has better hardware.

when will these idiots get it?

Interstellarmind

Phone manufacturers are totally shooting themselves in the foot by allowing this. For example, I just ditched my Droid X in favor of a thunderbolt. Why? because HTC isn’t as locked-down as Moto (yet!). This means, I’ll probably not get the bionic and jsut wait for HTC’s dual core offering (on verizon, of course).

bottom line: manufacturers who lockdown will not get my money. manufacturers need to man up to carriers and not let them lockdown their phones… because they will lose more business in the first place.

also, contrary to what maunfacturers may think, offerring rootable devices WILL build loyalty. that’s why i stuck with moto as long as i did (i had an OG and DX). sure, I may not buy EVERY new phone the company will put out, but my great user experience, made possible by rooting, would make me stick with the brand that gave me that good user experience. because here’s the thing, it’s not the software that matters, manufacturers. it’s the hardware. android will take care of the software for you, you worry about the hardware. and if you clamp down on rooting, etc, then guess what? i will jump ship to the next manufacturer that has better hardware.

Well, I can see a silver lining in the fact that the first thing the Carriers are doing is attempting to find out who is rooted. Lets hope that the sheer number they see will give them pause about truly pissing us off.

Well, I can see a silver lining in the fact that the first thing the Carriers are doing is attempting to find out who is rooted. Lets hope that the sheer number they see will give them pause about truly pissing us off.

Anonymous

I think its fine. Not perferable…but i don’t root all of my devices really…especially since no one likes to support macs…..and i hate windows…but love android…

Personally sprint actually does look to be the most android friendly right now as they said they aim to be…but until they have lte and sims like vzw….and a red logo…lol…im not switching…

tmobile….ahhh they suck with att…and i never licked them…more or less thought they were for the cheapest people but thats just me….there service kind of sucks in my opinion but its cheap…their android offerings are ok and still open so…

ATT…SUCKS BIG TIME….locking their devices down, no side loading, worst support…and actually if you have a tiered data plan then technically they are the most expensive carrier with least reliability…thats just my opinion.

I think verizon and sprint have the most potential over all but personally verizon because they have the cash, service, and contracts….

THIS IS JUST MY OPINION.

Wireless Fool

I rooted my phone strictly to allow me to remove the junk I don’t want nor would ever use, i.e. amazon mp3, city id, and vz navigator etc. If you put your bloatware on there so be it, but I’m allowed to remove it from my PC so why not from my phone. And why should I be forced to have an icon for something like vz navigator that will never be used because I already get google nav services with the data I’m paying you for. I can understand not wanting to allow free tethering or service a phone that the end user has mangled, but to lock me down because I want to have a clutter free device or I want to try a ROM that someone has developed to improve my user experience is damn near communistic! Ok, rant over. I think this 32 of the last 34 days of rain in Portland/Vancouver has got me a bit on edge. I’m off my soap box now.

Maybe they’re seeing how many people are rooted to how many people arent rooted and if he rooted people outweight the unrooted, then they get alot of devs to come in and make one big mega rom so we wouldn’t have to root(wishful thinking)

jag28co

This is the perfect oportunity for Google to start their own Telephone business. If google allow users to do whatever they want with their device i am sure more than one will be happy to move to GOOGLE WIRELESS.

jag28co

This will also help with fragmentation since Google will have the control of all updates on their network.

Anonymous

What happened to that library of congress amendment stating we had full rights as users to do as we wish with our devices? Anyone have a link to those old articles?

I don’t think their beef is that you are altering your device, I think its that you are altering your device to allow free tethering etc, and that is a clear violation of the carrier’s TOS. Its a violation of Verizon’s for sure, I just reread it this morning…gotta love slow mornings in Costco.

Tyler Buchanan

Doesn’t prevent the carriers and manufacturers from locking the device, only prevents them from suing you for finding ways around their hurdles.

Anonymous

Ahhhh great point Tyler. Legally they can make it Fort Knox, they just can’t sue us if we manage to get to the gold.

Anonymous

What happened to that library of congress amendment stating we had full rights as users to do as we wish with our devices? Anyone have a link to those old articles?

Jerry Lange

Why ccant tthey just remove the tethering apps from the market? Seems much more simple DUH

Tfasdf8

People make them then sideload them.

Tfasdf8

People make them then sideload them.

Alphabets13

i year upgrades arent disappearing…just pay $50 or so up front and just sign a 1 year contract anymore. thats what i plan to do.

STROWS

We should be allowed to root! If they can start tracking who is rooted and tethering illegally then they should just note on our accounts that we are rooted and if tethering continues illegally then automatically enroll us in a data share plan and not be eligible for any type of insurance. It is my phone, I paid over 600 dollars for MY PHONE and I should be able to do what I want to with it.

Theft of Service? Gimme a break. When I tether my Droid to my laptop, I’m not using any more (or less) service (or bytes) than if I was using just my Droid. The main difference is I can get to those websites (and or apps), that just don’t cooperate very well (or even exist) on mobile. Hell, I’ve probably streamed magnitudes more data via Pandora and Slacker in a single month than all the data combined that I’ve consumed whenever tethered.

If I can’t do what I want with a phone I purchased, I’ll go back to using a ‘feature phone’. Being always connected is nice, but for me at least, it’s not necessary. I had a PocketPC once, and WiFi was enough. I never lamented not having connectivity 24-7.

Anonymous

if this happens ill just go back to one of my standard messaging phones and use my tab for everything android!

Britboy3000

Well remember what goggle is doing? They are making sure each and every phone meets andy’s approval. The guy behind Android who want’s this to be open with deem whether or not phones will be good for the community. It’s kind of a double edge sword though that could end up hurting both parties….

I think with them knowing the amount of users out there that are rooted, it may spark them to create more power Dev devices and market them to people like us. They can’t just ignore us, it wouldn’t be a wise decision. We are Android.

I think with them knowing the amount of users out there that are rooted, it may spark them to create more power Dev devices and market them to people like us. They can’t just ignore us, it wouldn’t be a wise decision. We are Android.

Anonymous

They are using a slight of hand with this. You can do what you want to your phone. But if you want to use their networks, you need to follow their rules. So while you are 100% free to root your phone and do whatever you want, they are not legally bound (yet at least) to provide you service on it…

Blake

P3 needs to stick to hacking and not yacking. Complete BS

Anonymous

Pedantic Note: Tethering is not data theft. I pay for a contract which gives much $x amount of bandwidth per month. In a sane world, I should be able to use that bandwidth as I see fit.

Now, we don’t live in a sane world. The carriers cry about data usage. They cry all the way to the bank (which major carrier is in serious financial trouble? Oh that’s right, none of them). They over-charge for just about every service they provide, and they still cry unfair.

So boo hoo to them. I know I will be losing sleep over their blight. Well, perhaps not…

just cause you pay for a data plan doesnt mean you can use that data(which is meant for your phone only) with your xbox or computer, using these devices on their network will put unbearable stress on their network

unlimited data usage only applies to your phone and how much data that uses NOT how much data you can use for every single device you own

Anonymous

Well, if you buy that argument (which I don’t), then where is the line? Can they say that you can’t use the YouTube app because it uses too much data? Can they say that you can’t use SpeedTest because it puts too much stress on their network? Can they say that you can’t use app $x for $y reason?

Your argument of “unbearable stress” is a [email protected] cop-out. If they can’t supply the bandwidth they bill for, they should upgrade their infrastructure. Either that, or don’t provide it as a service. But to offer either a fixed tier of service, or an unlimited plan and then complain when using the services offered places “too much stress” on the network is nothing short of immoral…

There is only one long term sustainable model. One where you pay for access. What you do with that access is up to you. Any other model will hurt someone significantly (be it a content provider, a user, etc). What the FCC calls Net Neutrality is a joke.

Tyler Buchanan

The line is obvious, if its on your PHONE, then its legal, if its on something else, you aren’t paying for it and its not. I really don’t see how that’s that hard to understand. They can provide the amount of bandwidth they bill for, you’re demanding to be billed the same yet take two or three times as much bandwidth. Honestly, you’re just making yourself look stupid.

Anonymous

That’s a very interesting point. However, by that logic it’s 100% acceptable to use my phone to seed 10gb of torrents, using the peak rate possible (hundreds of GB per month), while it’s completely unacceptable to tether and use youtube for 1 gb per month…

And for the record, I’m not saying I should get 3 times as much bandwidth as I’m being billed for. I’m saying I should get the bandwidth I’m billed for, and use it how I wish. If that’s not good enough for you, simply make a reasonably priced tiered system, and all these problems and debates go away…

it doesnt allow p2p programs so you will have your line terminated if you do that

Anonymous

Ok, then what about downloading movies legally via non-p2p sources? We can play the chicken and egg game of TOS all day long, but no matter how you slice it there is always a flaw in it that just doesn’t make sense unless you look at it as a whole rather than as the sum of parts…

show me one app that allows you to download full movies for android that doesnt create piracy issues

ill give you a hint
NONE

Anonymous

Who says it’s an App? What about websites? It’s perfectly legal, and happens right now. All you need to do is know where to look.

Keep trying to poke holes. The fact of the matter is that I can do legal things with my phone that are far worse than the average user tethering their devices. Trying to argue otherwise is a lesson in futility…

Anonymous

Because I can promise you that a majority of the movies downloaded are pirated content. What is the last PUBLIC DOMAIN movie you downloaded that didn’t require a filesharing or torrent site?

This is like the people trying to argue that something is ok because .02% of the people using it do it properly.

Rizzidy

Doesn’t matter. If it is capable of substantial non-infringing use, it is good to go. See Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, Inc., 464 U.S. 417 (1984).

Anonymous

Even if you take away the downloading movies, you can still eat tons of bandwidth legally. And that’s my point. I can do things with my phone which are not only 100% legal, but are actually a 100% valid use-case for a phone, which would eat more (or as much) bandwidth as tethering.

Oh, and just because something can be abused illegally doesn’t mean it should be illegal itself. A car can be used as a lethal weapon. Does that mean we shouldn’t have cars? But that’s another argument for another time.

can you burn as much bandwidth as an xbox can using your phone?
can you burn as much bandwidth as a computer game like halo can?

ill answer these for you, NO
tethering to browse the web is one thing but people tether to play computer games, or to stream movies from netflix

point being if you tether without a plan, your stealing
there is no justifying that your right and they are wrong

your a thief and you deserve to have your line canceled for breaching your legal contract you signed and you deserve to pay a shit ton of back fees

nuff said

Raziel36

I have, on more than one occasion, used 6+ gigs in a month without tethering at all. Nor did I do anything illegal. Gaming? Seriously? The data compression makes gaming a non-issue, the times I’ve tethered and gamed were some of the lowest usage times my phone has seen. Get off your high horse and know some facts before speaking.

Rizzidy

Gaming barely uses any data.

Rizzidy

The stock web browser, for one.

Slikktic

Its called YouTube, which has SEVERAL full movies LEGALLY! All that can already be streamed on your phone. Also Hulu has a beta app that I haven’t tested myself, but will most likely be pretty similar to YouTube. Why would it put stress on a network that they already use paid mobile broadband use? seems to me like they just want more money for the same service. Also what is the deal with Text messaging rates, isn’t this data that sent from the phone? how come we have to buy an extra data plan just to get unlimited or extra text messages? Also why does sending a text message cost 50 times more than a larger email message? If the phone company really wants to get picky about the data charges like tethering on rooted devices, then I’m all for fighting it. We already pay out the butt for unnecessary services.

Anonymous

Youtube and Hulu both have mobile optimized versions of those movies which are much SMALLER than their desktop equivalent .

And you don’t “FIGHT” a bad policy by signing a contract and then disregard it. You fight the policy by REFUSING to agree to it.

Slikktic

How do you know they are mobile optimized versions? You can browse to the YouTube site using the phones browser and adobe flash and stream it the same as a computer. You still didn’t mention why we pay sooooo much more for txt messages that are data sent from the same device that we already pay a data plan for. As for fighting it, I think we can all say that just because we sign a contract doesn’t me we can’t ask or “Fight” for a better contract or deal. Do you work for verizon or something?

Anonymous

You fight for a better deal by not signing the contract. You lose all ground you stand on if you break that contract. Why should a company change policy to meet the needs of customers who won’t follow policy anyway? I don’t work for any carrier, I’m just a customer who hates it when other customers act selfish and try justifying it as fighting for their rights.

so people should tether xboxs and other gaming consoles to their cell phones so they can play online with just cause they pay for the unlimited data?

under your logic of data is data is completely retarded, xboxs connect to 3 different servers just to sign into their online service and they stay connected consistently transferring data back and forth between your xbox and their servers

now your phone will never be able to connect to 3 different game servers and consistently communicate with the servers

now i know this seems unrealistic but i have seen people on droid forums, mydroidworld, and droidxforums ask how they can tether their xbox to their phone or how to tether their playstation 3 to play online with

Kpratt

But thats just it. My phone is using that data. The fact that I then later transfer that data from my phone to another device is none of their business or problem. If I download a 1gb movie to my phone and later copy it to my PC via usb, thats perfectly legal and within my contract. Tethering does the exact same thing but without a delay or the inconvenience of that middle step.

Thats like saying your router on your home network is the only thing that should download, and you need to pay an extra fee for each computer you plug in. As was stated, we are charged $xtotal data so no matter how much data we download we ARE paying for it, the type of data and its application have little to no bearing on how it effects their network. Streaming a movie to my phone and streaming it to my pc over my phone will use the same mbps as just to the phone.

so people should tether xboxs and other gaming consoles to their cell phones so they can play online with just cause they pay for the unlimited data?

under your logic of data is data is completely misguided, xboxs connect to 3 different servers just to sign into their online service and they stay connected consistently transferring data back and forth between your xbox and their servers

now your phone will never be able to connect to 3 different game servers and consistently communicate with the servers

now i know this seems unrealistic but i have seen people on droid forums, mydroidworld, and droidxforums ask how they can tether their xbox to their phone or how to tether their playstation 3 to play online with

DroidzFX

Data on the phone and a PC is no different except that you will consume more on a PC. Your not getting any more bandwidth. Only strain this places is the amount data and the time period it is being used that the carriers didn’t account for. They dont expect you to be using data for an few hours straight on your phone.

If everyone went out today and bought a usb modem you dont think they could handle it? It uses the exact same network. Carriers just want you to pay separately for the data because they are greedy. I say F■ck the TOS. We pay enough that it should not matter how we choose to access the data.

ok thief
if you get your contract canceled and if you get banned from every cellular network(yes it can happen just like how you can get banned and refused service from cable companies for modifying cable modems for higher bandwidth) you better not complain and bitch how they cant do that to you

Yeah your just another sheep in the herd going with the flow. You must like getting bent over and stuck b/c thats exactly what they are doing. I am not altering bandwidth. I am just using the data where I see fit. If I use 5GB in month on my phone and some tethering thats no different If i used all 5GB just on my phone.

DroidzFX

Yeah your just another sheep in the herd going with the flow. You must like getting bent over and stuck b/c thats exactly what they are doing. I am not altering bandwidth. I am just using the data where I see fit. If I use 5GB in month on my phone and some tethering thats no different If i used all 5GB just on my phone.

Anonymous

If using the amount of data that you bought puts unbearable stress on their network, why would I pay for it. Basically if they are selling me a service they can’t provide, why bother buying it?

people tether their computers to play online games like halo which uses a consistent amount of 2GB of data per 3 hours and people tether xboxs so they can play call of duty with it which also uses the same amount if not even more data than halo would on the pc

those types of tethering cause unbearable amounts of stress on their network because their network is built for the occasional movie stream and 200MB download

Rizzidy

You have no idea what you are talking about. The network is fully capable of handling it.

show me one wireless network that can handle a consistent 2GB transfer to 3 different servers(making it 6GB)

mptrh336

If you had ever tethered and watched your usage you would know that you could play any one of tjos games for over and hour and use less than 50megs of data DOWN. You will however transfer much more ddata up.

Anonymous

Because they’re not selling you that service. Check your Terms. They’re all rather explicit on what the data they’re selling you is intended to use.

Just because YOU think unlimited means something doesn’t mean that’s how they’re selling it to you.

It’s the difference between offering a “free” tank of gas to a lawnmower and offering the same amount of gas to a hummer. the Free tank only applys to one.

the amount of people rooting their phones is a TINY fraction of the population. i am sure of it. so for us rooted users occasionally using a free wifi tether app, we wont stress the system. and even thought i could potentially use LTL from my phone as a great substitute for my cable provider, thats till just me and the rest of my house would want to have a traditional option too.

just cause you pay for a data plan doesnt mean you can use that data(which is meant for your phone only) with your xbox or computer, using these devices on their network will put unbearable stress on their network

unlimited data usage only applies to your phone and how much data that uses NOT how much data you can use for every single device you own

nalpakj

I do support your stance…the carriers make plenty on data and if we buy a certain amount of data usage we should be able to use it in whatever way we choose.

But the reality is that we buy data plans from a carrier with a bunch of legalese that includes verbiage restricting tethering without a tethering plan. So we are buying whatever bandwidth we have on our plan…but we’re buying it on their terms, nor ours.

I want to make it clear…I think it sucks and I don’t lose any sleep over any revenue the carriers lose from people that tether outside of the carriers’ plans. I don’t like it…but that is the reality. They can place whatever restrictions they want on how the data is used since their lawyers write the contract that we agree to.

nalpakj

I do support your stance…the carriers make plenty on data and if we buy a certain amount of data usage we should be able to use it in whatever way we choose.

But the reality is that we buy data plans from a carrier with a bunch of legalese that includes verbiage restricting tethering without a tethering plan. So we are buying whatever bandwidth we have on our plan…but we’re buying it on their terms, nor ours.

I want to make it clear…I think it sucks and I don’t lose any sleep over any revenue the carriers lose from people that tether outside of the carriers’ plans. I don’t like it…but that is the reality. They can place whatever restrictions they want on how the data is used since their lawyers write the contract that we agree to.

Anonymous

If your plan was limited, this would be true, but this isn’t the case if you have unlimited data (with or without the “”) on your phone. The reason for this is that “6 months of free gas” for a civic is very different from “6 months of free gas” for a hummer. What we as consumers need to demand is Bucket data. Meaning we buy a specific AMOUNT and then use it however (and on whatever devices) we please, be that USB stick, phone, or wifi. Arguing about our “rights” to use “unlimited handset data” however we want will only strengthen the carrier’s case.

Major carrier in serious financial trouble: Sprint (their last positive quarter was YEARS ago)

Tyler Buchanan

Agreed, his argument falls apart because Verizon makes you buy unlimited data. You’re buying as much data as you can use on your PHONE, if you would like to use data on other devices, you can buy that too.

Anonymous

True, but some of us only tether to use a keyboard, mouse, and larger screen. When I tether on my computer or Cr48, I’m doing the same thing I do on my Droid: GMail, YouTube, FaceBook, internet surfing, etc. I’m not gaming, torrenting, or any of the like. My next handset will have an HDMI out, and maybe I’ll pick up a bluetooth keyboard and mouse.

It’s different for those who are tethering to do things their Android handset can’t, I’ll grant you that.

Anonymous

Youtube has different bitrates for computer and android based viewing, and facebook loads a lot more content on your computer than it does if you go to m.facebook.com. I’m not saying your tethering is a real burden on the network, because I don’t think it is, just pointing that out. In other news… I kinda have to hate you for having a Cr48.. I really want one.

The real issue with tethering comes in when people use it instead of a home internet. I know someone bragging about consuming 120gigs on this Incredible. Now granted, he has one of the grandfathered tethering packages that gives him unlimited data, but I’m sure there are people who try and do the same with Wifi Tether.

But the whole “carrier’s hate rooting because of tethering” argument is a little short sighted. The real issues are people who root without understanding it and cost companies hundreds of warranty replacement units because they didn’t bother to figure out what an .sbf is.

angermeans

What you are proposing is exactly the reason carriers are forced to lock down devices. Just because we pay for unlimited TV does that mean we should be able to illegaly share with our friends and family? What about an apartment complex? Where does it end. The point is we pay a price to have unlimited data on our phones and there is another price if you wish to share that connection with another device. Any other way of sharing that connection is against the TOS and the very reason these companies are making such harsh decisions when it comes to locking down our beloved Android devices. I’m not going to sit here and say that during my life with Android and rooting that I have not tethered and used data that I didn’t purchase, but what you are proposing is the exact reason we have this dilemma. I think if most used 1-2 gb of data and a little of that was tethered then this wouldnt be a problem, but the ones that are tethering are the the 2% that use somewhere near 95% of the bandwidth (I believe I read this from ATT so take it with a grain of salt like I did I have no proof on the matter). I only use this statistic as even if the numbers aren’t that drastic that is pretty crazy. These “2%” of users are 100% of the problem and are to blame for companies spending millions of dollars to save billions of dollars (or whatever that turns out to be).

With that said I don’t think tethering is 100% of the problem. Most carriers take a loss year to year on equipment and make it up in service plans on mostly post paid accounts. They don’t make any money on getting the newest best phone they make money on monthly plans and 2 year contracts. In order to get us the 199 with two year contract on the newest android phones on the market they immediately have to make up the price of that phone. The reason I am saying this is that I work in customer care for one of the major 4 and tethering is not all of the problem in fact I would say it is less than half of it. I see on a daily basis people rooting their phones and not reading up on what they are doing and as soon as they run into a problem (which less face it they will) they immediatly call and make up some BS story which the carrier has a policy to attempt tech support and then replace the device (as long as within 1 year warranty). A huge number of these phones come from people that root their phones and dont take responsibility for their actions when something goes wrong. This is a huge reason companies are doing all they can to stop the bleed. The more and more android phones get popular the more and more 1 click root solutions pop up and people make these mistakes. The company I work for has spent countless dollars in equipment, training is handling and noticing equipment replacement fraud stemming from rooting, and tethering. I think most just automatically think these companies are making so much money on equipment and because these phones cost so much people are willing to take the risk. I am not saying the big four dont bank billions, but I am saying if their is something that is costing their company millions of dollars a year then I promise they will spend a boat load of money to stop it. If that means making OEMs like Moto, HTC, and Samsung lock down their phones then they will (and are). If we would all take some time to read up on what rooting is like most would back when the OG Droid and Nexus One was out and take responsibility like they should then this wouldnt be such a huge problem.

With all that I don’t honestly think that there is a way out of this we have come to far and the carriers will lock down these phones and I feel that it is wrong, but I also feel that us as consumers taking the approach you mentioned in your post is also wrong. All that will do is drive prices up, end up losing unlimited plans, and lock down our phones. Like I said I think we have all come to far and there really isn’t anything else we can do, but we do share in the blame for what is going on and taking the approach of well I paid for it so I should be able to use when and how I want will make this worse.

Anonymous

Wow. Very well presented.

Just so it’s clear, I’m 100% for charging people for what they use. Get rid of the Unlimited plans (which aren’t) and toss in a tiered model, and most of those issues with bandwidth go out the window (since those 2% can still do it, but they are paying for it). This of course implies that the pricing model is reasonable.

As far as your point on rooted phones, I think that covers it quite well. Again, very well presented…

Rizzidy

‘Enter’ key. Use it.

DroidzFX

1-2 GB is a little on the low side. I use 4 some months and thats without tethering.

Tergiversator_Maximus

That’s always amazed me – even at my highest usage (on the road 14 hours a day, using Google Maps and Pandora all day) I was still struggling to get over 2 gigs in a month. I don’t understand how people are able to consume so much data. I have an OG Droid running stock android.

Unfortunately I agree with you. Rooting the phone as become too widespread and there are too many retards out there trying to root the phone just so they can be cool, but don’t have the intellectual wherewithal to pull it off. Droidforums.net is getting sunk with buffoons in the hacks section asking completely moronic questions in broken english and poor grammar, betraying their sub 100 IQ, lack of age, lack of wisdom, or all the above and insisting on the right to root their phone.

Rooting is something that should be done by tinkerers and those who belong to intelligensia. Not morons! The problem is that these morons are ruining the party for everyone.

It’s just like buying a car. If I go buy a brand new car hot off the floor, then go home and overhaul the engine, if something runs amiss with the work I did, I’m not going to go charging into the car dealership demanding they warranty my inability to properly aftermarket my car. That’s what rooting is people! Aftermarket customization!

Here’s my solution. Since there is a database of people who have rooted their phone, they need to bake into the warranty that the only warranty exists for people who accept the latest official firmware upgrades. Thus shunning the rooted fraudsters. Since you have the database, use it!

Carriers: tell the low IQ rooted crowd tough noogies if they bring a bricked phone in for warranty that you know is rooted. That’s it! Problem solved. If you want to make the root process a little trickier, you are only going to be inviting morons to brick their phone with a tricky root process. Just make it relatively easy (aka: OG Droid easy), but let them know up front that rooting = voided warranty, and then stick to your guns. In terms of tething, most reports show that just about everyone will use less than 5 gigs, even us tether-in-a-pinchers. It’s (again) the morons who are tethering their phones to their PS3’s or doing online multiplayer that (again) is ruining the party. How bout this, just throttle after 5gig (but we’re free to use it however we please, you know…since we paid for it and all), and flip the switch after 7. So once they use 7 gigs that’s the ballgame. I’m ok with that. I use wifi whenever possible, Opera mini (90% data compression) for browsing, and if I need to tether, I do it responsibly. Get on, don’t check out 720p youtube videos (you know…common sense) and get out. I use the tethering primarily for business. And if it were not available for free, no I would not pay for it at all.

Rizzidy

What a waste of time to write that. Rooting already voids your warranty. Everyone knows that.

N.O.Y.B.

well, no. Sorry Rizzidy.

not if you have a hardware problem. especially if you are honest with the rep, and give a detailed description of the symptoms, and what you did (and didn’t) do to your phone, and the steps that you used to try to identify and eliminate the software end of the problem.

they can’t fix it anyway! your better off fixing it yourself. if it’s h/w, unroot and flash it back to the way you received it and send it in. never once have they been able to fix a problem

Anonymous

But that doesn’t stop idiot customers from bitching until they get a replacement anyway. Contracts are the problem more than anything else. Since you have a contract, they have to help you, even if it was your idiot actions that ruined the phone.

If a carrier could actually turn customers away for ruining their phones through rooting, they wouldn’t try and lock them down like they do. Full stop.

Chrismcan

haaa, i was thinking the same. My attention span is too short to even bother reading that.

Anonymous

Then that’s your problem, not the original posters.

palomosan

When my Incredible broke, I was rooted, used the zip file to revert to stock brought it back and they sent me another Inc refurbished.
So I think his point is right, lots of noobs rooting phones but have no clue what their doing or how to revert back to stock before returning the phones.

When you root, you have to keep up everyday, since when the updates hit, you can always go back, get updated then root again, it only takes a day.

Anonymous

I would go down to 3 gigs from unlimited and pay verizon 5 dollars more if I could use my data how I want to use it.

I actually believe that Verizon is going to start giving tethering away for free once they move to a tiered system. I think that letting all droids (including the thunderbolt) tether for a couple of months is a test to see how much people actually tether and if their networks can handle it.

have you heard of a bricked phone caused by rooting? i havent. people think they do. but in the end they’re stuck. i think some of you guys work for vzw is all. and afraid of being replaced by another moron.
did you ever talk to CS or go to a vzw store? talk about morons! wow!

Anonymous

Ha you put your Verizon employee Id as your handle…lol

Silksmooth12

Yes I have seen bricked phones caused by root attempts. And then the rooter (against my urging) calls up t-mobile and gets a replacement under warranty. So yes I have personally seen this.

bmac420

i’ve tried bricking my droid x and my incredible and my roommates two droid x’s… its damn near impossible, you can always get to bootloader (unless you have bad hardware in which case rooting wasn’t the cause) and you can always sbf to a working verision using rsd lite and then start from there again. i’ve been in boot loops, bootloader boot loops, force closing of every app ass soon as the phone boots… none of this is irreversable. most “bricks” in my opinion are cause by the user not knowning how to fix the problem they caused. but it is mostly all fixable.

Drakunis

I work for one of the 4 big carriers. I see a bricked phone from rooting come in 3-4 times a month. It isn’t difficult to figure out that they rooted it. Id tell you what phone is the most common, but that would give away who I work for.

Foedawg1

You people here on this site tell everyone to root I have a OG DROID not rooted an now your blaming the same people you told to root.

Silksmooth12

Nobody said to root and then be irresponsible with the phone.

Fedupcitizen2

What a prig you are. You should run for president.

Mads Ono Pen

The TV comparison is really poor. He pays X cents per X MB. It’s a pretty straight forward comparison of his money to his bandwidth to do what he wants. So unless you pay X cents per X eyes on 1 TV, you attempt to compare apples and oranges.

And your statement about the 2% of the users being the problem…no, it’s the carriers, 100%. They failed to understand their market, they failed to improve their infrastructure and they lied to their customers about the services they were selling. Those 2% are definitely troublesome…but they aren’t the problem and the only blame they deserve is unmasking the underhanded business practices of the carriers.

I can buy that the problem isn’t tethering…I have had this conversation before. But locking phones down is a bad solution to the problem. And by bad I mean pointless (we will find a way) and probably illegal (we are legally allowed to alter our own property, it saddens me you want to dismiss this right so readily). I suggest a more open approach with a solidly build backup & restore process, an already open boot loader and dropping the “unlimited” lie. That way everyone is honest and happy. Problems can be fixed, people have their freedom.

Calculatorwatch

Totally agree. If they just capped the data it would eliminate all problems of bandwidth hogging via tethering. Plus if they then made tethering free they would actually make more money because people would use way more data without realizing and they could charge overages.

jason w.s.

Actually, the TV comparison is not poor at all…This all kinda reminds me of whats goin on between Time Warner Cable and The Big television networks right now. Time Warner (if you havent heard) put out an app that lets you stream cable television onto your iPad over WiFi in your home, and ONLY as long as you are in your home can you watch it, and theyre givin it to the customers free. Pretty nifty actually, my son and i both have it on our iPads. Well, the big networks dont think this is fair, because the customer should be paying THEM extra to use this service. Even though, as Time Warner argues, the customer is already paying for their cable service, and should get to watch it on as many, and on any screens in their home that they’d like….tricky stuff. Who’s right, who’s wrong? Nobody knows. Cant wait to see how it all pans out though.

bmac420

the tv comparison is poor actually, cause its like saying that only one person can watch a tv at a time per tv. thats like saying you having all your friends over for a superbowl party is breaching the terms of service cause you’re sharing the tv service with them.

In my opinion, the TV analogy is not a good one.
Whether you have one or one hundred people over your house watching the same streaming TV show does not require any additional bandwidth from the provider.
However, if you have 5 devices tethered to your phone, you are probably taking up more MB than the one device would.
I’m not saying that tethering should be banned. I think the MB’s are yours to use in any way you want as long as you paid for them.

Nod

problem is these providers give us 2gigs a month. SO what does it matter where and how we use this 2 gigs? Why should I pay 20+$ more a mo to use the same 2gigs on my laptop once every 3 months for blogging? Now if I have to pay $20 more and get say 20gigs a mo ok. It is just them charging for BS. Like ringers and everything else. Rental fees. I remember when Japan got the early custom ringer phones. Magazines had steps to program songs in. All free. All yours. Then we got early ringers here in the US and they charge us 3.95 a month to rent the ringer.

The old case of screw the consumer over but if the consumer is screwing them, the holy war begins.

Rfgjune1968

If people are going to root, and they are, keep the phones open! Charge the user who “bricked” their phone, say half of what it would cost to replace it using insurance. Make it so the carriers can tell that the phone has been rooted. Similarly as they do when the phone gets wet and save the “real” insurance claims for real accidents!

Anonymous

I think that not everyone should be able to root their phones. As soon as some idiot gets a phone and starts reading the boards they hear about rooting. Then they jump into it without doing the required research and then of course mess something up. And since they didn’t do the research they are not aware of what they need to do to recover things, or they clog up the boards with the same questions over and over.

I think anyone that has ever returned a phone because they “THOUGHT” they bricked it is a SCUMBAG and the reason for all this. If they had half a brain they could fix it… but they don’t.

I think the developers should only allow people to get the info to root after they have shown they know what they are doing.

The Thunderbolt is a little more involved than the “one clicks” of the past and should not be attempted until you have done some reading.

And if you mess up your phone don’t be a thief. Either learn how to fix it or find someone that is smarter than you to help. Do not return it to the store… they know what you have done.

The idiots and morons are ruining everything for everyone.

Apsmojo

I completely agree. After two months of reading and researching until i finally understood exactly what it means to root i finally took the plunge. Of course i ran into a couple issues here and there, but i’m grateful i took the time to learn about it and not panic when the triangle/exclamation screen came up. I used the Super-One-Click at first but felt like i was cheating so reverted back and did the old fashion way with my OG. My main reason for rooting my phone was the customization and to make it faster. I have no need for tethering (but if i ever need it its nice to know its there) . All that said. I agree, take the time and understand what your doing or don’t do it at all.

The350zWolf

I personally subscribe to the idea that the phone companies should just be that:Phone companies. By this I mean to compare this to your run-of-the-mill ISP (land internet). When you buy their service, that is what you get, internet service. Sure, they try to throttle the bandwidth as soon as they can tell if you are downloading from a torrent, but sure as hell they don’t have any right to tell me what computer to use, or what operating system to run in my computer and certainly if I can plug a scanner, router, printer or anything of the sort.

Suppose that I buy an unsubsidized phone and root it. Do they have the right to tell me to unroot my phone? If I am buying unlimited service, then that is what I expect to get, unlimited service.

I agree with the post on buying “data in buckets” or tiered. If I know that I need 5Gb, then I should be able to use it whichever way I want and on whatever device I have. Again, if I buy unlimited, because that is what is available, then it should not matter if I tether or not.

About people not reading and informing themselves and bricking their phones and then returning them for replacements is completely unacceptable, shame on these people. People should be responsible for their own actions. Nevertheless if the carriers agree to replace these phones without checking the true reason of failure, then it should be their loss very well deserved, because everyone knows that rooting your phone voids the warranty. Ignorance can not be used as an excuse.

I believe that P3 has hit the nail on the head. The bottom line is the money. By enforcing people who tether to buy the tethering plan will certainly increase their revenues substantially. Case in point is the text plans. If you go by the text, it is $0.20/text. The 250 text plan is $5.00 ($0.02/text) and the 1000 text plan is $15.00 ($0.015/text). To the carrier the cost per text is approximately $0.001 or less. Their business model is that all customers need to spend a certain minimum for the service, so on average I’m willing to bet that right now is about $100/month-person. With the new plans and LTE this will rise to about $150/month-person. It is not that the carriers are losing money, because they still turn a profit as it is, it is that they want to maximize their revenue, regardless of the means.

Anonymous

Ha! $100 arpu (average revenue per user) is really really high. Currently vzdub is running right around 46. The target? No idea but that is just an absurdly high number to throw out there.

Austin B

Technically we pay $X amount for unlimited data. It says no where specifically that we can’t share the connection with our laptops. Its “our” unlimited data and we should be able to extend it to our personal computers as we see fit. Wow we might use and extra gig of data. Woohoo

Teon39

That’s how I feel as well “unlimited data means unlimited data” no bs throttling or flipping at switch at a certain gb I pay 30 per month for unlimited and I will use it any way I see fit until the unlimited plans are gone then my days of having a smartphone will be history.

Anonymous

You make a nice point here. But lets not forget, it says UNLIMITED data. Meaning there is no limit to my data.

jason w.s.

No limit to the data you use On Your Phone…Unless you are paying for WiFi Hotspot.

Anonymous

If using too much bandwidth was really the core problem, then they could fix that by applying a bandwidth limit to customers. If only 2% of the customer base uses more than this “imaginary limit, or what’s ethically allowed according to them” then this would solve that problem.

They have the power to impose reasonable limits that would only affect heavy data users. So, that is not the problem. The problem is that the mobile carrier business has grown spoiled by forcing their customers into limitations and charging an arm and a leg because your options or alternatives are limited. Why must I pay an additional 30 dollars a month to tether a device? Is it because you expect me to use more data if I tether to a PC? If that is the problem, then like I said, impose a reasonable bandwidth limit instead of trying to control what we do with our phones completely.

Trust me, companies like Verizon charge you a lot more money than what it costs to maintain their business. It’s robbery and the average person is not technically or economically knowledgeable to understand that. This is all about control. They want to give you as little as possible and charge as much as possible. Being able to control your phone and it’s software ensures they maintain this control.

Don’t forget that before Android phones came out, Verizon put their own software on all their phones to control what people could and could not do with them, often locking out useful features that said phones would normally have to begin with. With a company like that, it is really no surprise at all that they would pursue these types of tactics to regain control of their users.

It’s all about money.

Roguesword

I call BS. Have you ever tethered for any length of time? After several minutes they down throttle your connection to be next to useless on VZW. So saying that a few users use 95% of bandwidth is impossible given that they’re bottlenecked so bad. No, they know people will pay and that is all the reason they need. To me it is like having bought a truck but having to pay extra to to put a passenger in it. It came with the seat, why should I have to pay to use it.

anon

True but remember, the reason they have caps on data is because theres no such thing as infinite bandwidth. When power users hop on and use the data for a primary source of internet, it slows it down for everyone else. We tried unlimited in the beginning, and of course people took a mile. Not so much big red crying, but other customers crying.

Tergiversator_Maximus

You signed a contract that requires you to follow a terms of service – it doesn’t really matter what you think makes sense, the law is pretty clear. Think of not paying for tethering like hacking your modem to upgrade your speed or your cable box to give you premium channels – sure, you’re paying for the base service, but that doesn’t entitle you to all the premium features.

Granted that’s not a perfect analogy. And I do feel pretty weird defending the phone carriers. I’m not saying that’s not how it should work, but it’s just not how it does work.

You pay unlimited data to view in YOUR PHONE. There’s a reason they have caps on the hot spot service.

To justify something that violates your contract is wrong. I admit, I installed wireless tether myself. I never saw a need for it, but I figured if I were in the field and needed to transmit some written business to HQ, it’d be a great backup. I’ve since uninstalled it and can either wait to get back to my home or office to transmit or pay for the hotspot temporarily if it’s that urgent.

Underoath403

🙁 I really hope they dont do this. question though, if there going to check who is rooted by the people who dont update. can’t we find a way around this?

If you want to tether legally … why not just buy the program from http://www.tether.com. You pay one fee for the program and no monthly fees for tethering after that. I use it now on my Blackberry and they have it Droid too.

Djmike0408

If you want to tether legally … why not just buy the program from http://www.tether.com. You pay one fee for the program and no monthly fees for tethering after that. I use it now on my Blackberry and they have it Droid too.

DroidzFX

pretty sure they didnt get permission from the carriers to run that app. Its the same thing as the free app except you pay more.

Ironclad1313

Unfortunately that is still not tethering “legally.” Real tethering would require you to pay the monthly Verizon tethering fee since they are the ones providing the service. Paying for an app that others provide as opensource does not make it “legal.”

IMO tethering should not be charged for in the first place since you are paying for the data plan. It’s just that carriers want as much money as possible from us……

Idk why this is such a big deal really. The iPhone has never allowed the type of access gained by jailbreaking the device yet with every iOS update there is a new jailbreak that follows to allow the freedom we enjoy by doing so. In fact, the court decision that made such actions legal will eventually find its way to including other devices the more they try to lock down the phones. As long as there is security to keep people out there will always be someone who will enjoy the challenge of breaking that security and allowing the freedom we used to easily enjoy with Android.

Ironclad1313

I think the situation may different for rooting because this time the problem involves the carrier and providing services instead of manufactures like Apple. Sure, the Android community enjoys the challenges of breaking security but its a different matter if carriers completely block service from the devices and leave it a brick. You would have to trick Verizon’s tracking method into thinking that you aren’t rooted which is as of now an undisclosed method (just like the method AT&T has for finding people who are tethering)

Ironclad1313

I think the situation may different for rooting because this time the problem involves the carrier and providing services instead of manufactures like Apple. Sure, the Android community enjoys the challenges of breaking security but its a different matter if carriers completely block service from the devices and leave it a brick. You would have to trick Verizon’s tracking method into thinking that you aren’t rooted which is as of now an undisclosed method (just like the method AT&T has for finding people who are tethering)

I don’t understand since when does owning the device mean we can’t do with it what we want? sure we may be locked into a 2yr contract with a carrier, but it is still our phone. at no time during the contract will AT&T ever come asking for the phone back. when I buy a car from Dodge I am able to tweak it/mod it as I see fit. as long as it is road worthy dodge doesn’t care what I do to the car because it is mine, why do we accept anything less from a phone?

I don’t understand since when does owning the device mean we can’t do with it what we want? sure we may be locked into a 2yr contract with a carrier, but it is still our phone. at no time during the contract will AT&T ever come asking for the phone back. when I buy a car from Dodge I am able to tweak it/mod it as I see fit. as long as it is road worthy dodge doesn’t care what I do to the car because it is mine, why do we accept anything less from a phone?

Anonymous

In fact, they don’t care if it’s not road worthy either. You bought it, you can do whatever you want.

Private Tucker

Dodge doesn’t own the roads you’re driving on. If they did, they might have a say in what you do to your auto. Verizon on the other hand, owns the network you’re using that device on. You can do whatever you want with your device, but not on their network.

but how am I effecting their network but removing bloatware, upgrading the software on my schedule not theirs? fine they want to say tethering is some big hit to their network I dont buy it. I paid for 2GB how I use it should be my right if I go over fine hit me with an overage fee.

Rizzidy

Verizon doesn’t own the airwaves, we do.

Anonymous

but they DO own the backhaul, towers, and cell sites. They also paid billions to use that spectrum, and billions more investing in the infrastructure needed to support it (fiber). You’re using a device that a carrier paid the manufacturer millions for (in addition to hundreds for each device actually purchased).

What you do with that device is your business. What you use Verizon’s (or Sprint, or anyone elses) Network (fiber) for is theirs.

Rizzidy

You are missing the point. Without a license for that spectrum granted by the public, they don’t have a wireless network at all. They CANNOT just do whatever they want with that spectrum which is owned by the public.

ricandroido

unless ypu want to claim warrantey and its one of the aftermarket parts you installed that is causing the issue then your s.o.l.

but other than tethering how is anything I do to my phone impacting their network? that would be like an internet company telling me to use their cable modem I must run Win XP SP1 until they approve Vista or Win7 for their network.

AnothaMexican

Anything made by man can be undone.

AnothaMexican

Anything made by man can be undone.

Digiflame

If this really is the future I may have to drop my android phone and just get something like an htc flyer tablet and a dumbphone.

Digiflame

If this really is the future I may have to drop my android phone and just get something like an htc flyer tablet and a dumbphone.

Alvinm 77

I’ll be sticking with my Thunderbolt for awhile then as long as me being rooted doesn’t leave me data-less. If so I’ll be leaving VZW for a pure stock device for the simple fact that I hate bloatware. This info isn’t shocking though but just sad.

Kevoskee

I like having freedom with my devices. I support the manufacturer by buying the device they make. So why invest money on locking bootloaders when they get support from non rooters and people who do want to root

stanger

who wants to buy a product that you can’t completely use?
and then when you find a way around it, they want to install something that tells them that you are enjoying your device that you paid $600 dollars for.

Anonymous

Innocent question. What can you do with a rooted device that you can’t normally do?

DROIDMOE

That may be the real question. What is possible with rooted device that isn’t when locked?

Anonymous

I HATE the look of stock Android. In my opinion stock Android is the ugliest looking OS in the smartphone market. So rooting has given me the freedom to change the look of my phone. That and overclocking the CPU are the reasons I rooted.

Anonymous

So cosmetic and overclocking… I’m not particularly concerned with either. So is there any base functionality am I missing if I don’t root?

I haven’t felt a need to replace my OG Droid yet as I have Android Gingerbread 2.3, I’m running at 1GHz, and I have all sorts of cool, new features that the outstanding devs build into their ROMs. I haven’t used tethering in months, either (there’s less and less that I find I can’t do on my Droid, these days).

I think my next device will be a 7″ tablet with a 4G radio and an open bootloader. That way, I can do as I please and the carriers can’t say anything as I paid for an allotment of bandwidth; not for use on a particular device. I may even get a WiFi tablet and a 4G MiFi, and use GB’s WiFi calling with GVoice so I can use either the tab or the Droid (though I’d have to carry around an additional piece of hardware that way).

Anonymous

Thanks for the info TMex. Sounds like it opens up a lot of low level stuff.

Can a stock device stream music or video from a DLNA server?

Is there any problem with me loading my music or video onto a stock phone?

crap. if locked down then i won’t think twice about jumping ship to the latest and greatest whether it be webos or wp7. i love android and perhaps THE biggest reason i love android is the openness and rootability of its devices.

crap. if locked down then i won’t think twice about jumping ship to the latest and greatest whether it be webos or wp7. i love android and perhaps THE biggest reason i love android is the openness and rootability of its devices.

take that away completely and you are no different than apple.

Anonymous

My thoughts exactly. The ability to root and go outside the bounds is a big reason for staying outside of the walled garden of Apple. If that’s taken away…well…then there’s no differentiation there. Obviously Verizon doesn’t care about that since they’re now on Apple’s “list”…but Google should surely be keeping an eye on it.

Rishi

Who’s no different than Apple? The post specifies that the Carriers are locking, not Google.

I think he’s saying the end result is like the iPhone. Of course it’s not Google locking down the phones, but if you have a locked phone, knowing it wasn’t Google isn’t of much comfort. This is precisely the reason I switched from VZW/DX to Tmo/Nexus S, I was tired of being told how to use my device.

Rizzidy

Quit being pussies and write to the FCC if you don’t like this. Your worthless online petitions and blog-comment whining aren’t going to have any effect.

Rizzidy

Quit being pussies and write to the FCC if you don’t like this. Your worthless online petitions and blog-comment whining aren’t going to have any effect.

Timmah

Yeah, cause you can just write to the FCC just like that. If you dont like em, dont read em.

Yeah actually… I wrote them a nasty-gram about sprint a few years back and they got me out of an $800 bill :]

The FCC is my hero

Anonymous

way to be a douche

Anonymous

He’s actually partially right. Complaining to the carriers and manufacturers wont do anything. They know they will still get your money. We need to organize an official movement and direct it toward the FCC.

Rizzidy

There is no need to organize any movement. Just write them an email now. The more emails they get on this subject, the more attention they will pay to it. Trust me, as an insider, I can tell you they are already spending a lot of time on net neutrality and the broadband plan and they are very receptive to comment right now.

edit: Also, I hope people take more than 5 minutes and type something intelligent. Comments the likes of “Verizon is f**kng stupid.” or “Unlock our phones” wont do anything. Type out a legible serious letter without swearing or name calling.

Rizzidy

I agree that the comments should be well-presented but I don’t actually think that should be something to hold people back. Any comment is better than no comment and as long as it lets the FCC know that you are pissed off, it will still be worthwhile.

Sigmundroid

This guy ^^^ is a paid disinfo agent/shill.

Don’t listen to a word he/she/it says.

@Timoh: DO EEET. Lay the ground work NOW and begin recruiting people to write the FCC or
start a petition. We will all support it.

ANYONE here against the idea of pushing our right to object to the bullshit any cell phone carrier feels
they have over us needs: to do this.

Hey Rizzidy: get your raggety assety out of here man!

Rizzidy

Uhhh…. what?

Anonymous

I don’t follow the rest of your post but I’m not the right guy to start an official case with them, it should be someone with more information about whats going on. I don’t have time to start researching everything either.

Rizzidy

Don’t listen to that idiot. You don’t need a “case” to send an email to the FCC. Just send an email. The more people that contact the FCC about carrier data policies, the more attention they will pay to it and perhaps begin a rulemaking procedure, which is what we really want.

Anonymous

Oh yeah definitely, I will send an email but I’m not going to organize anything. Was just saying.

Good point. You should write a letter to everyone who posts a comment and let then know…

Ralph Trentacosta

I do not see how you can allow an open-source O/S and then deny users to tinker with it. I always said if a person calls T/S and they have an issue and the phone is rooter, the carrier should have the right to say “please restore your phone to factory and if the problem persist then we will help”. That is wrong with that?

Ralph Trentacosta

I do not see how you can allow an open-source O/S and then deny users to tinker with it. I always said if a person calls T/S and they have an issue and the phone is rooter, the carrier should have the right to say “please restore your phone to factory and if the problem persist then we will help”. That is wrong with that?

Sigmundroid

How can you not see it?

The OS: isn’t the carrier: it is Android.
The carrier HAS the option to lock down the OS as they see fit because it is:

Their service.

Sadly if you don’t like it?
Don’t have a smart phone.

Personally the carrier’s decision to do so is a breach of the current agreement I and many of us have signed.
So perhaps a smartphone is not the device to have anymore.

If you can’t give up your precious push emails/fb updates?
You deserve to have locked down phones.

Sure, it should be OUR right to choose whatever we want because “WE” are paying for it.

Which is why you need to learn how to accept a contract by crossing out whatever you don’t like:
and write in whatever you do.

Scott_okeif

So, to summarize your opinion, Service Providers –because they offer a “Service”– have legal permission to block/lock down devices on their network? Therefore, ISPs have the right to restrict our choice in Operating Systems and any modification to our PCs(including the OS)?

This logic does not compute.

Don’t get me wrong, I realize subsidized devices can/should be subject to the terms of the service agreement; whether that includes alterations to root acces, or bootloaders, is questionable. In terms of tethering that is just the price of admission for a subsidized(read: discounted) device. However, for people who out-right buy the device–off-contract–the Service Providers domain, legally, is limited to the service provided; hence the name, Service Provider.

That’s what I’ve never understood. We would never put up with Comcast or AT&T dictating what we can or can not do with our computers that are “accessing their service,” so why do we take so much crap when it comes to the exact same service just through the airwaves? Maybe it’s time we require cell companies to use a standard and we can buy a smartphone completely separate from the provider. Kinda like the Wi-Fi standard.

Anonymous

I don’t think that’s any more legit than an ISP telling you exactly which brands of computer and operating systems you are allowed to use.

My ISP will not provide technical support for Linux machines connected, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t use one.

Verizon should provide technical support for your custom ROM, but I don’t think it should disallow you from using it.

Sigmundroid

How can you not see it?

The OS: isn’t the carrier: it is Android.
The carrier HAS the option to lock down the OS as they see fit because it is:

Their service.

Sadly if you don’t like it?
Don’t have a smart phone.

Personally the carrier’s decision to do so is a breach of the current agreement I and many of us have signed.
So perhaps a smartphone is not the device to have anymore.

If you can’t give up your precious push emails/fb updates?
You deserve to have locked down phones.

Sure, it should be OUR right to choose whatever we want because “WE” are paying for it.

Which is why you need to learn how to accept a contract by crossing out whatever you don’t like:
and write in whatever you do.

Anonymous

I will continue to root as long as I have the opportunity, even just out of principal. If things do go this direction and the dev devices are released but low quality I will go back to feature phones that only make calls.

Dan Mazz

This really bothers me as the reason I am so interested in Android is because of the freedom.

If they use this logic “Verizon and another major carrier seem to be tracking rooted phones by seeing who has not accepted updates.” It will be flawed because as an unrooted use, you can deny the update. This would not be a good way to determine rooted users.

Anonymous

That is the general idea of what they are doing. Full details have not gone public.

Denying updates is infuriating… a long time ago after my GF got her Droid, I told her not to accept the latest update because there was no root for it yet (one of the earlier Froyo builds I think?) and I was going to root it when I had time. She complained daily about how annoying the update notification was.

It wouldn’t surprise me if this is the way they are going for tracking it. I think the next step is to figure out how to fake a successful update.

Anonymous

I believe Verizon Android phones will only let you refuse an update for a certain time period and then it forces you to. I thought it was something like 30 days, but am not sure if true, just what I “heard”.